What sites should you trust on the internet? It seems like there should be an online service provider that can tell us which web sites are really trustworthy.
Digg.com post, “Harvard economics researcher Ben Edelman conducted a study (PDF) to determine if sites certified by TRUSTe, a nonprofit organization that analyzes privacy policies, really respect user privacy. Using MacAfee’s SiteAdvisor tool to compare almost 1,000 TRUSTe certified sites with over 500,000 non-certified web sites.”
TRUSTe did not do well in the study. In fact they only have de-certified two web sites that have been associated with their certification process. In this case, a third-party provider certifying a web site does not provide any real confidence that a site is trustworthy. I think the Better Business Bureau (BBB) does the best job in certifying trustworthiness. If a web site has ties to a BBB it demonstrates that the business has been in business for awhile and that it has ties to a local community. I also like using Alexa. Alexa gives you an idea of how long the web site has been in business and the volume of traffic the web site is getting.