Facebook Protects Users from Untrustworthy Websites with Web of Trust Reputation Ratings

Web of Trust (WOT), the world’s leading crowd-sourced website reputation rating service, and Facebook, the Internet’s leading social platform, begin collaboration today to give Facebook’s over 500 million users reliable protection against dubious web links. When a Facebook user clicks a link that leads to a page with a poor reputation rating given by the WOT community, Facebook shows a warning message. WOT’s global community has reported five million sites for phishing, untrustworthy content, fraudulent services or various scams.

Helsinki, Finland and Palo Alto, CA – May 12, 2011

Facebook’s ability to protect its users from malicious links is significantly improved with the use of WOT reputation ratings. Whenever a Facebook user navigates to an untrustworthy site a warning will appear allowing the person to avoid the link, learn more about the rating or continue forward. Web users have rated more than 31 million websites with the free WOT add-on. WOT’s free service has over 20 million users and is maintained by Finnish company WOT Services Ltd.

“Facebook cares deeply about preserving user trust and providing users with the best tools to enjoy a safe experience online. We are excited about our partnership with Web of Trust–they share similar goals and approaches in giving users better control of their online experience, “ says Jake Brill,  Manager Site Integrity for Facebook.

“Web of Trust protects Facebook’s interactive environment by providing reliable, practical, real-time information that people can use to keep their social networks safe. Friends take care of each other, and make the entire web safer, by rating websites with the WOT safe surfing tool,” says Vesa Perälä, CEO of WOT Services Ltd.

In addition to Facebook, users of the WOT tool also see reputation icons on Google search results, email links, Twitter and for shortened URLs. Each user can rate websites themselves and add explanatory comments. WOT ratings are recalculated every 30 minutes to ensure users have the freshest and most reliable information. The free WOT add-on works in all web browsers and is easily downloaded at mywot.com.

WOT’s crowd-sourced model regularly uncovers dangers and threats that automated algorithm-based systems miss. Typical examples include pointing out e-commerce sites with questionable business practices and giving advance notifications of content not suited for children.

About WOT Services
Web of Trust (WOT) is a community-powered surfing tool that boosts trust on the Internet, by using authentic user experiences to help web users find reliable websites. The leading community-based safe surfing tool uses an intuitive traffic-light rating system to help web users stay safe when they search, surf and shop online. Website ratings are powered by a fast growing worldwide community of over 20 million users who have rated the reputation of 31 million websites based on their experiences in terms of trustworthiness, vendor reliability, privacy and child safety. Information from selected technical services is also used. The add-on works with Firefox, Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, Opera and Safari and is a free download from www.mywot.com.

About Facebook
Founded in February 2004, Facebook’s mission is to give people the power to share and make the world more open and connected. Anyone can sign up for Facebook and interact with the people they know in a trusted environment. Facebook is a privately held company and is headquartered in Palo Alto, Calif. Facebook® is a registered trademark of Facebook Inc.