Not all Bitly users are using them for great factors. Some people utilize them to hide nefarious links. Fortunately, there is an easy method to quickly identify whats behind a Bitly URL without in fact clicking the link. The technique is to simply include a “+” to the end of any Bitly URL. When you add the “+” the URL will reroute to Bitly instead of to whatever the original URL was. That will then reveal you the Bitly page on which the reduced URL is hosted and will show you what the original link was..
You can try this trick with a URL that I recently reduced. Bit.ly/ THWTAPRIL will lead you directly to a copy of the slides that I used my recent Intro to Teaching History With Technology webinar. Bit.ly/ THWTAPRIL+ will lead you to the Bitly page where you can see my original presentation URL and see when I produced the reduced URL..
See this short video to see how you can utilize the “+” trick to learn whats concealed behind a Bitly link..

Bitly is a helpful URL shortener that Ive utilized for several years. As a signed up user I can develop customized, reduced URLs that individuals can in fact spell. I utilize these whenever I require to share a link to a Canva or Google Slides presentation because the default URLs provided by those services are incoherent and constantly long..

This post originally appeared on FreeTech4Teachers.com. It has actually been used without approval if you see it elsewhere. Websites that regularly steal my (Richard Byrnes) work include CloudComputin, TodayHeadline, and 711Web.

Applications for Education.
Building good digital citizenship and cyber safety abilities is something that everyone must be helping our trainees do. Revealing them little tips like this one to avoid clicking on suspicious links is one of the ways that we can help our students develop their digital citizenship and cyber security abilities.

Bitly is a handy URL shortener that Ive utilized for lots of years. There is a simple way to rapidly determine whats behind a Bitly URL without actually clicking on the link. When you add the “+” the URL will reroute to Bitly instead of to whatever the original URL was.