Frequently Asked Questions
What exactly does Link Truth do?
Link Truth identifies misleading hyperlinks where the website address displayed to visitors differs from the link's actual destination. It can display a warning badge and present a confirmation window before visitors follow the link.
Does Link Truth block suspicious links?
No. Link Truth is designed to inform visitors rather than automatically prevent navigation. When click confirmation is enabled, visitors can review the destination and choose whether to continue or cancel.
Does it detect phishing websites and malware?
Link Truth can help expose deceptive links commonly associated with phishing attempts, but it is not a malware scanner or website reputation service. It cannot determine whether a website itself is safe or malicious.
Will it warn visitors about every external link?
No. Link Truth focuses on supported hyperlinks that display a website address which does not match their actual destination. Ordinary external links without a detected mismatch are not flagged.
Can I disable the warning badges but keep the confirmation window?
Yes. Warning badges and click confirmation can be controlled independently through the Admin Control Panel.
How does subdomain detection work?
Administrators can choose whether related subdomains should be considered matching destinations.
For example, a link displaying example.com but pointing to shop.example.com can either be treated as matching or flagged, depending on your configuration.
Can I exclude trusted websites?
Yes. Link Truth includes a trusted domains setting that allows administrators to exclude specified websites from triggering mismatch warnings.
Will links pointing to my own forum trigger warnings?
Link Truth includes an option to ignore internal links, allowing destinations pointing to your forum's domain to be treated as safe.
Does Link Truth support dark and light styles?
Yes. The confirmation window uses XenForo's native overlay system, allowing its appearance to inherit the active style's settings rather than imposing a separate modal design.
Does it work with dynamically loaded content?
Yes. Link Truth includes support for detecting supported links that are added or updated after the initial page load.
Do visitors need to install anything?
No. Link Truth operates within your XenForo installation. Visitors do not need browser extensions, additional software or separate accounts.
Does it require an external API or third-party service?
No. Link Truth does not require external scanning APIs, third-party accounts or additional service subscriptions.
Which XenForo versions are supported?
Link Truth 1.0.0 is designed for XenForo 2.3 and requires PHP 8.1 or newer.
Is any configuration required after installation?
Only if you wish to customise its behaviour. Administrators can enable or disable detection, warning badges, click confirmation, internal link exclusions, subdomain matching and trusted domains through the ACP.
Does Link Truth guarantee that a link is safe if no warning appears?
No. An absence of warnings does not guarantee that a destination is trustworthy. Link Truth identifies supported visible-address mismatches rather than evaluating the safety or reputation of every website.
It should be considered an additional layer of awareness, not a replacement for existing security measures.