How to copy and paste hyperlinks in emails?

I've read numerous times not to click on hyperlinks in emails for safety reasons. However, don't know how to copy and paste hyperlinks in a new tab or on the address bar. I've tried it and can't get it to work. Guess it must be simple huh?

 

right click on the hyperlink then select "copy link location"

then you could post it into googles search engine or something to see if their is any security threats associsated with the link

 

Thank you, but it doesn't work in any search bar, only in the address bar. In doing so, what is the difference in safety then?

Forgot to say that I'm using Firefox for my Yahoo Webmail. I've tried the same in IE but it won't let me do it at all. Perhaps it's the ISP or the set-up of my webmail.

 

I have had 7 e-mails this week that were red flagged by my PC although i am curious to know what they are i just delete them.

Having said that if you use one of the freezing programs or sandboxie it may work, no doubt people better qualified than me can give more info.http://www.clipartof.com/images/emoticons/xsmall2/723_armed_gangster.gif

 

I'm referring to emails to which I've subscribed to in forums and newsletters, e.g. MG, CNet and Consumer reports, and wouldn't dream of clicking on any unsollicited email which contain hyperlinks. Unsollicited mail is mostly spam anyway, end up in the "spam" folder which I delete immediately without even looking at them.

Is it still safe to click on the above-mentioned hyperlinks? Thanks.

 

If the links are from a trusted source i don't see any problems but i have heard of one infected PC corrupting another with e-mail attachments. (it happened to me i think, a while back) http://www.clipartof.com/images/emoticons/xsmall2/1930_.gif

 

Thanks Bill. My ISP Webmail scans for any email attachments by (Norton) when I click on them. I save them to my desktop anyhow and scan them again with an antivirus and spyware/malware prior to opening them. Perhaps I'm overly paranoid but I've never been infected that way.

 

Thanks Mark. From now on I will *not* click on hyperlinks in emails even from trusted sources such as MG's when I subscribed to threads.

 

So, there's no such thing a trusted source? Umm, there really seems to be some paranoia here. Sorry, but it's getting pretty ridiculous, IMHO.

 

I probably wouldn't go to that extreme necessarily... For example, I get the newsletter from newegg and it contains links to specials and such... I see no problem in following the links in the letter, and if you wanted to check, you could check the URLs. No matter who sent the email, if the URL is legit, well, it's legit... You can view the source to see the URL.

And something to keep in mind is that, when HTML is used, even if the link text is a URL, it doesn't meant that's where that link is going. With html "the link" text and the URL text are separate, so even if the link says google.com, it could point to yahoo.com. At any rate, you CAN check the links to see if they point to legit sites by viewing the source. I'm sure there are scanners out there that check emails for malicious links, as well.

I'm not saying that following a no link in email policy is too strict or paranoid, I'm just saying, I think there are other ways to remain safe and still use links in emails.

A pretty good policy for attatchments, IMHO, is simply verifying with the sender that it's legit. For example.. You check your mail and it looks like a friend has sent you an attatchment that you weren't necessarily expecting.. catch them on IM or give them a call to check before you open it, even if it passes a scan. No scanner is perfect.

 

I agree. I click on dozens of links every day in emails from trusted sources, and I recognize the emails.

Is there any way a site can infect you, other than running scripts? To that end, I use Firefox with NoScript installed, and no script can run without my express permission.