Wow, F—kedcompany.com has received $18 million in venture capital funding. (http://news.yahoo.com:*****@216.150.6.36/Yahoo!%20News%20-%20PK%20Interactive%20receives%20funding%20from%20idealab.htm)
And MTV is going to broadcast the wild Burning Man festival, according to CNN.com. (http://www.cnn.com@66.70.3.6/2002/SHOWBIZ/04/01/Music/MTV/)
The stories and Web pages seem authentic, but they’re not. Look closely at the URLs — the @ symbols in the first part should tip you off that something’s fishy. It’s a ploy tricksters use to make it appear as though you’re reading CNN.com or Yahoo.com. In fact, the addresses of the servers the stories are living on are 216.150.6.36 and 66.70.3.6.
Enter the numbers here and you can find out where the servers are based and what company is hosting them.
These were just a few of the hoaxes circulating on April Fool’s Day. (For a run-down of some of the others, see
http://www.cyberjournalist.net/features/aprilfools.htm.)
Aside from common sense, how do you know if a website you’re looking at is trustworty?
Let’s say you come across http://www.whitehouse.org while looking up a speech of President Bush’s and see the headline, “President Reassures Latin Americans ‘Ogethertay, Eway Allshay Overcomeway.'” Before you go writing your expose about Bush’s mastery of pig latin, check the domain name (whitehouse.org) at http://www.allwhois.com/. Turns out it’s not the White House site after all, but one run by SatireWire. (Another clue, in this case, is that official government sites end in .gov).
AllWhois.com also serves a handy purpose well after the blush of April Fool’s has faded. For instance, say you’re looking for information on prescription drug costs and you find what looks like a useful site. You can use AllWhois.com to find out whether the site is published by the pharmaceutical industry or a center that promotes holistic healing. And you can usually get phone and address information so you can get in touch with someone to interview.
When looking at Web sites, it’s always a good idea to follow the advice of the conspiracy-loving X-Files: Trust no one. The truth is out there (with a little digging).
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