For those that aren’t familiar with the bits and bobs that make the Internet run, hopefully this might help – I’m posting it because there’s another round of fake posts flying around Facebook, infecting people’s accounts, and leaving a lot of people frustrated.

Domain names are the label you want for your site, followed by the type of domain (ie .com, .org, .tv, .ca, etc.) So, basically, YourNameHere.com – these can have subdomains, which are like slapping more names in front of the main domain. So, MyStore.YourNameHere.com, or porn.YourNameHere.com, and so on. They can even be things like secret.porn.YourNameHere.com, as you put more and more prefixes in front.

This is how phishing scams like to try and fool you.

whatisthis.facebook.com is a facebook like just as much as www.facebook.com is, BUT…

facebook.whatisthis.com is NOT a facebook website address. The phishers have registered whatisthis.com for the server of their little scheme and then added “facebook” as a sub-domain to fool people who will think it’s a real facebook link.

So, now you know – but here’s one more tip.

Sometimes in your email you don’t see the URL in the message, instead it’s a hypertext link, like on a website – meaning, there’s a bit of text that says “Click Here For Awesome Stuff and I’m Totally a Facebook Link!” – is it telling the truth?

Two ways you can find out – if you’re using web email, like Gmail or Yahoo, put your mouse pointer over the link, but don’t click it – then look at the bottom of your browser – you should see the address of the link there. Similarly, if you’re in an email application, and it won’t show you the address URL, try right clicking the link, choose the option to copy the link to clipboard, then in an open browser window, right-click the browsers address window to paste the link back in – DON’T HIT ENTER – as long as you don’t tell the browser to go to that address, it will just sit there for you to look at and judge if it’s a real address. You don’t have to put it in the address field – you can paste it into the Google search bar, or Word, or a text file – anywhere you can paste text, and have a look.

So, that’s the quick and dirty guide to helping not get nabbed by a scammer.

And remember – nothing on the Internet is so awesome you can’t take a moment to email a friend and ask them to confirm they sent you the link and that it won’t cause trouble.

Except the Mean Face baby – that kid is hilarious!