Top 10 domains you should NOT be clicking on: .zip, .country and more

A new report by security experts has revealed the most dangerous addresses on the internet

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by Jessica Anais Rach |
Published on

Blue Coat has revealed the top websites associated with suspicious activity on the web.

Their report 'The Web's shadiest neighbourhood domains' found that 100% of sites ending in .zip and .review were suspicious.

This means they were heavily associated with spam, malware or phishing.

The other eight domains, with 96-99% of the sites they host deemed suspicious, are as follows:

  • .country

  • .kim

  • .cricket

  • .science

  • .work

  • .party

  • .gq

  • .link

Warning that many of the domains are used solely for the 'purposes of scams and spam', Blue Coat's chief technology officer Hugh Thompson said:

"Due to the explosion of TLDs in recent years, we have seen a staggering number of almost entirely shady web neighborhoods crop up at an alarming rate.

"In order to build a better security posture, knowledge about which sites are the most suspicious, and how to avoid them, is essential for consumers and businesses alike."

Domains classed as the safest in the report are as follows:

  • .mil (military/ government associated)

  • .jobs

  • .ck (Cook Islands)

  • .church

  • .gov

  • .gi (Gibraltar)

  • .tel

  • .kw (Kuwait)

  • .london

  • .jp (Japan)

Advising on the best way to protect yourself, Thompson advised CBS News to use anti virus programmes- and common sense.

"If you can have a technology safety net sitting behind you that is making judgment calls based on real data, that is obviously the best way to go.

"Just be aware that there are bad neighborhoods online."

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