Spot a fake address before you click
Phishing sites rely on names that look right at a glance: paypa1.com with a number one, rnicrosoft.com with "r" and "n" pretending to be "m", pаypal.com with a Cyrillic "а", or apple.com.verify-id.top, where only the last part is the real site.
What the checker looks at
- Foreign alphabets: decodes
xn--addresses and flags names that mix alphabets. - Look-alike letters and numbers: 0 for o, 1 or I for l, rn for m, vv for w.
- Typos: names one or two letters away from a well-known site.
- Misleading subdomains: a famous name at the start of an address that really belongs to someone else.
- Hidden destinations: links with an @, where everything before it is ignored.
Questions
Does "no tricks found" mean the site is safe?
No. It means the name isn't imitating one of the well-known sites we compare against. A site can have an honest-looking name and still be a scam.
Is anything sent to your server?
No. The checks run in your browser.