AVG LinkScanner
By Joy Stapleton

AVG’s LinkScanner is a free browser tool that was designed to protect you from hacked or exploited web pages by automatically scanning and analyzing the links contained within your web searches. You’ll be able to know whether or not a web page is safe before you even get there.

The AVG LinkScanner, using very little of your system resources, runs unobtrusively in the background, and provides you with immediate protection from harmful web content. The “Search-Shield” scans your web search results and places a safety rating icon to the right of each link.

Detailed information is made available by holding the mouse over the safety rating icons. The safety ratings are defined by AVG as follows:

Safe -> Safe and free from exploits, phishing, social engineering and other threats.

Questionable -> There is a very limited chance the page may contain harmful content. You should be wary if the site/page is unknown to you or it involves online purchasing or login information of any kind.

Risky -> There is a reasonable chance that the page contains links to harmful content. You should not go there unless you have previous experience with the page/site and should carefully consider what personal information, if any, you share with the owner.

Dangerous -> The site has been set up to deliver exploits without user knowledge or permission and/or is a known phishing, social engineering or other malicious site. LinkScanner prevents you from accessing this site.

The “Active Surf-Shield” scans web pages for any link you click on, and additionally, for any web address you type into the Navigation Toolbar of your browser. AVG Active Surf-Shield will block any attempt to visit a website where malware has been detected.

Currently both features, Search-Shield, and the Active Surf-Shield, are available for the Firefox and Internet Explorer browsers, and only the Active Surf-Shield is available for the Google Chrome and Opera browsers.

As of this writing, LinkScanner is available for the following search engines: AOL, Ask, Bing, Google, and Yahoo (but only the "exploited website" icons are shown in Yahoo’s search results).

System Requirements: Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7

You can download the AVG LinkScanner at http://linkscanner.avg.com


Joy Stapleton started out as a mainframe Programmer/Analyst in 1985. In 1992 she became a PC software developer and PC technician. As a private consultant, Joy provides PC technical services and develops Web sites.