How to See What’s Hidden Behind a TinyURL

Last week I wrote
a blog post about how to see whats concealed behind a Bitly shortened URL without actually clicking the link. The trick is to include “+” to the end of the Bitly URL to see whats behind it without clicking on it. If the that worked with other URL shortening services, a few individuals emailed me to ask. The answer is it deals with
TinyURLs..

Heres a video introduction of how to see whats behind a TinyURL without really clicking on the link.

This post originally appeared on FreeTech4Teachers.com. If you see it somewhere else, it has been utilized without consent. Websites that regularly steal my (Richard Byrnes) work consist of CloudComputin, TodayHeadline, and 711Web.

The technique is to add a “+” to the end of any TinyURL address in order to land on a safe TinyURL page that reveals what the original link was that got shortened. You can then choose if you wish to click through to the destination or not.
If you want to attempt this with a TinyURL, tinyurl.com/emkns9a8 will lead you to the page for the Practical Ed Tech Virtual Summer Camp, however including a “+” at the end of that TinyURL will take you to the page where you can see the original link without clicking on it.

Applications for EducationAs I composed last week, building great digital citizenship and cyber security abilities is something that all of us need to be helping our students do. Showing them little tips like this one to avoid clicking suspicious links is one of the ways that we can help our trainees build their digital citizenship and cyber safety skills.

The technique is to add “+” to the end of the Bitly URL to see whats behind it without clicking on it. A few people emailed me to ask if the that worked with other URL reducing services. If you see it somewhere else, it has been used without approval.

Ive attempted the “+” trick with a bunch of other URL reducing tools and TinyURL is the just one besides Bitly that Ive found it to deal with..
Whats the technique?

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