Surfer-advising software

It's hard to imagine busy Web surfers (especially young ones) bothering with the slight slow-down SiteAdvisor represents to the search-and-surf experience, but we may be looking at our surfing future. SiteAdvisor is a think-before-you-click software product that, when you've turned up a bunch of search results in Google or MSN Search, tells you whether it's safe to click on links to specific sites. It's a free (in beta-testing) add-on to the Firefox and Internet Explorer browsers that Washington Post security writer Brian Krebs has been testing. The reason why it may be our future is because it deals with the sad new reality of Web surfing: all the bad stuff that gets on our family PCs when we click on the rapidly proliferating malicious sites that send the stuff. Some of that clicking happens in emails and IMs; the rest, Brian reports, happens when people click on "unfamiliar links that turn up in Google, MSN or Yahoo search results." Here's where kids and teens come in. They love games, music, contests, and all the sites and technologies that deliver them and allow the uploading of them. They're also known to click, upload, download, and surf fast, freely, fearlessly. Unfortunately, that's a spyware and malicious hacker's dream user profile. For example, Brian searched for "lyrics" in Google ("song-lyrics sites are notorious for installing spyware and adware," and where spyware is, keylogger software that, e.g., captures passwords and credit card numbers is not far behind). You have to read his account to believe all the crud lyricsplanet.com downloaded on his PC (do not go to that site!). Whether or not your family downloads SiteAdvisor, a family discussion about alert surfing, IM-ing, and emailing might be a good idea. Nasty Web sites' numbers are growing, and their URLs and promises often look great to kids.