answer:Your friend’s virus protection was either non-existent or out of date. I refrain from clicking on the obvious bogus links (worded as you have described), and when I send out even short emails I make sure to make the message one that says more than “Check this out [link goes here]” by giving the reader an indication of what will be found at the link. But I use TinyURL all the time, and I don’t worry about clicking links from friends (when they aren’t those obvious messages as above). The few times that I have encountered malware or Trojan loaders or the like at a TinyURL site, my virus checker has warned me before it even displays the page. To answer your exact question, though, Outlook shows “the hyperlink” in its bottom-of-the-screen status line. I think that TinyURL or bit ly would have to change their own schemas to enable a read-through of “the link behind the link” – but why would they do that, since it is so easy to make re-directs, or a chain of them, that none of the shortening services could have the resources to penetrate.