The Digital Trust Deficit updated: warnings built into apps, the Americas, and a toolkit
The report now draws on the Organization of American States’ 2026 report From Bank to Blockchain, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. It shows how quickly a region that comes online can become a target, what happened when one payment app in Argentina built warnings into the moment of payment, and what people who build apps and websites can take from it. It adds a thirteenth change and a double-page toolkit that sets every free tool along a path from knowing to championing.
New tools: Before You Send and the Trusted People Card
Ten yes-or-no questions for the moment before a bank transfer, including whether someone is on the phone with you, and a wallet card and lock-screen reminder naming the people who can help if your phone is stolen. Make your Trusted People Card.
The Digital Trust Deficit updated: what people say about their own protection
The report now includes the Oh, Behave! 2026 survey from the National Cybersecurity Alliance and CybSafe, which asked 5,000 adults in the United States, United Kingdom, India, Brazil and Singapore what they feel, what they do and what happens to them. It finds that adults in Generation Z say they lose money or data to scams more often than any other generation, that people feel more confident than they act, and that people who had cybersecurity training act on it. A new glance page, a new section and three new charts make the report longer. Download the updated PDF.
New guide: who checks the advert before it reaches you?
A state lawsuit, a 2025 news report, Meta’s replies and the Federal Trade Commission’s figures on scams that begin on social media.
New guide: the safety guide that works when the phone does not
Why a free, printable, large-print guide earns a place in a safer online world for all.
New report: The Digital Trust Deficit, who carries the cost of online scams?
A digital inclusion report from UtilForge.org bringing together figures from 31 countries on who scams reach, who is protected and who recovers. It finds that people with disabilities, people with little savings and older people carry greater harm, that most fraud is never counted, and that none of seven large technology companies reviewed publishes what people lose on its services. It sets out what has already cut losses and twelve changes that would help. Free to read, download, quote and share.
Why the first Google result can be a scam, and two new free checks
A new guide explains how search adverts, search engine optimisation and AI answers decide what you see first on Google, Bing and other search engines, where scams slip in, and eight checks that work on any of them. Is this the official government site? shows the part of a web address that decides where it goes, and whether it ends in a government ending in 50 countries and the European Union. Who sent this email? compares an email’s address with the company it names. Hide Names from AI now hides a first name at the start of a sentence, as in “Fiona and I”, and labels an Indian bank branch code as a branch code. Advert Check now covers search adverts in its advice.
A new creator playbook: sponsored search results that lead to fake sites
The creators page has a new playbook with a demo clip, script, captions, five example messages, dated sources and a large-print handout. Advert Check now also warns about phone numbers offered for support, bookings or refunds. The charities and community groups guide has a new section of free help from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the organisations it lists. The homepage and tools list now say fifty-one free tools, matching the full list.
The creators page is now a library: example messages, countries’ reporting routes and a data desk
The Specimen Vault holds 400 example scam messages with the brand names and links made safe. The Report and Recover Atlas lists where to report a scam and how to try to get money back, country by country. The Data Desk has 30 dated, sourced figures with charts, and the Production Guide covers making videos about scams. Alongside them are ten creator labs, each with a demo clip, script, captions and large-print handout.
The UtilForge.org accessibility page
UtilForge.org puts cybersecurity first, with practical tools and guides for a safer online world for all. The new accessibility page sets out how accessibility is approached, against the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1, level AA. The homepage has a new “Who we build for” section for older people, disabled people, people on low incomes and people coming online for the first time.
Eighty years of inventions that felt strange at first, and what they tell us about AI
From a 27-tonne room-sized calculator in 1946 to the chatbot in your pocket: how earlier inventions arrived, what artificial intelligence is in plain words, and four habits for using an AI assistant.
Free check: is this advert a scam?
The advert check reads the words of a Facebook, Instagram or WhatsApp advert, and the signs you tick, for nine groups of warning signs: pressure and countdowns, prices or prizes too good to be true, celebrity or news-brand endorsements, guaranteed returns, task-commission and pay-to-start jobs, requests to move to WhatsApp or Telegram, unusual ways to pay, copied shops, and requests for logins or codes. Each comes with what to do instead. It never says an advert is genuine, and it lists what it cannot do. It also sets out dated, attributed reports about scam adverts on social media.
New free check: is this AI app or extension safe? And stronger checks for disguised and non-English scams
The new AI app and extension check reads an artificial intelligence app’s or browser extension’s description, permissions or advert for warning signs: installs from outside the official app stores, requests for your password, keys or wallet recovery phrase, access to every website you visit, and “free, unlimited” offers that never say how they are paid for. The scam text check, the recruiter check, the prompt injection checker and what not to paste into AI now read spaced-out and misspelt warning words and the most common warning words in Spanish, French, German, Portuguese and Afrikaans, and say so when a message does not look like English instead of giving an all-clear. What not to paste into AI now also spots passwords, PINs and one-time codes written next to their label.
The VPN check, updated: other languages, disguised words, and when to switch a VPN off
The VPN check now reads spaced-out and misspelt warning words, the main warning signs in Spanish, French, German, Portuguese and Afrikaans, and download links sent through chat apps, no longer marks an app as a stop sign for listing what it does not ask for, and says so when pasted text does not look like English. A new question covers the moment you sign up, pay or prove who you are, when a VPN can get you refused. The guide, Do you need a VPN?, gains a section on when to switch a VPN off, plain definitions and clearer context for its figures. The free book, How to Become Safer Online, has a new chapter on VPNs. Every page now has a skip-to-content link for keyboard users.
Two new free tools and a guide: what could a criminal find, and is this warning real?
What could a criminal find about us? is a private checklist for families, companies, charities and creators, with the trick each public detail makes possible and one fix. Is this warning real? reads a forwarded warning for the signs of a chain message and of an official alert. The new guide, When trust is built to be used later, covers slow-burn scams, borrowed authority and false warnings.
Who it’s for: a guide for every audience, and a new homepage
Five new guides, each with the risks that audience meets most, dated sources, the free tools that fit and the pack that suits it: families, carers of older relatives, charities, non-governmental organisations and community groups, social media creators and libraries and educators. The guide for companies and small businesses has been rewritten, and Who it’s for now lists every guide and appears in the menu and footer of every page. The homepage opens with “Find the scam before the scammer finds you” and four doors: a suspicious text, a call asking for money, a payment and something pasted into an artificial intelligence chatbot. Every free tool page now starts with the same four steps, ending with what that check cannot do. Pricing and each pack page now set out what you get free, what the paid version adds and one flat price. Corrections: the festive sources list had a garbled line and now reads correctly; the Artificial Intelligence Tools for Work page and the small business guide no longer say “nothing uploaded”, and say instead that everything runs on your own computers.
Safe & Savvy After 60 now has its own page
The free video course for people aged 60 and over, useful at any age, has a home: every lesson, the habit and free tool that goes with it, and notes for libraries and care homes. Lesson 2, on AI voice copies and the family safe word, is the newest.
New free tool and guide: do you need a VPN, and is this VPN safe?
The VPN check asks a few plain questions and shows what a virtual private network would and would not do for you, with the UtilForge check that helps for each thing a VPN cannot fix, then reads a VPN app’s description, advert or permissions list for warning signs. The new guide, Do you need a VPN?, sets out what researchers and the Federal Bureau of Investigation found in free VPN apps and how to choose one.
From Halloween to the January sales: festive season checks and four new free tools
The new festive season section lists the dates from Halloween on 31 October 2026 to Lunar New Year on 6 February 2027, with the check for each seasonal harm, a checklist to print, a block for families sharing with older relatives and one for small online shops. Four new free tools run on your own phone: the delivery and toll text check shows whether a text’s link belongs to the courier it names; the shop check looks for copied brand names, missing contact and returns details and risky ways to pay; the gift card request check spots requests to pay with gift cards; and the first-hour guide puts the steps in order for anyone who has already paid, by country and by how they paid. The main picture on the homepage and the pack pages now loads first, and the offline helper no longer holds up a page while it updates.
The United States federal order on DeepSeek, in plain words
What the Department of Homeland Security order published on 20 October 2026 covers, who it applies to, and three questions to ask before buying any product that uses artificial intelligence. No UtilForge tool uses DeepSeek or any other outside artificial intelligence model.
You can now support UtilForge
If you would like to help UtilForge reach more people and build a safer online world for all, you can now support UtilForge with $5, $10 or $20 a month. Supporting is never needed to use anything on the site.
Creator packs: ready-to-teach scam safety, free every month
For creators, teachers, librarians and community groups: one scam, the evidence, a 60-second script, a free check to film and a large-print handout. Pack 1: Never pay to get a job.
Eighty years of inventions that felt strange at first, and what they tell us about AI
From a 27-tonne room-sized calculator in 1946 to the chatbot in your pocket: how earlier inventions arrived, what AI is in plain words, and four habits for using an AI assistant.
Developing story: PHP2Shell, the two critical PHP flaws
What happened, what Amazon, Reuters and others report about attacks, why government websites went offline, and what website owners and visitors should do. Updated 22 October 2026.
The federal order on DeepSeek, and what to keep out of any assistant
The order published on 20 October 2026, what it covers and what it does not, and four steps for households and organisations.
New guide and two short videos: the words you cannot see are the words your assistant reads
A new guide explains how web pages, emails and documents can hide instructions for an artificial intelligence, with what the National Cyber Security Centre, the Open Worldwide Application Security Project and Google’s own security team say. Two short demonstration videos, recorded with the internet switched off, are on the UtilForge YouTube channel: Hide names from artificial intelligence and the Prompt injection checker.
The prompt injection checker and invisible character remover, improved
The Prompt injection checker now undoes words broken up with an invisible character, look-alike letters, numbers used as letters or line-end hyphens before it checks them, recognises common rewordings and six other languages, and no longer cuts a web address in half in the cleaned copy. White text on a dark background is no longer treated as hidden. The Invisible character remover keeps the invisible characters that family emoji, the flag of Scotland and Persian, Arabic and Hindi words need, catches fake web addresses written entirely in look-alike letters and can swap them for ordinary letters. The checker page now has a section on what it catches and what it misses, with links to every source. Hide names from artificial intelligence now puts the real details back even when an assistant drops the square brackets from a label, writing NAME 1 instead of [NAME 1].
Two new free tools: Prompt injection checker and Invisible character remover
Before you ask an artificial intelligence to read a web page, email or document, paste it into the Prompt injection checker: it finds instructions aimed at the artificial intelligence, hidden messages and hidden page text. The Invisible character remover finds zero-width spaces, hidden messages, look-alike letters and tracking codes in copied text and gives you a clean copy. The homepage now opens with Hide names from artificial intelligence, and every tool page says what it is: 100% free, no sign-ups, no tracking. Short address: utilforge.org/names.
Black-box checks now catch a box over part of a line
When a black box covers only part of a line, such as the account number at the end of “Account number: 4021…”, Is It Really Blacked Out? and Release Check check every letter and show exactly which words can still be copied out. A new button to get Family Safety Tools after a scam text or recruiter check.
The scam text check now catches family emergency messages
A message such as “Grandad, it’s me, I’m in trouble, don’t tell anyone, send money now” is the family emergency scam, and the scam text check did not flag it. It now warns when a message claims to come from a family member and asks for money, describes an emergency such as an arrest or an accident, or asks you to keep it secret, and it tells you to call your family member back on the number you already have. Before You Pay has the same fix. Everyday family messages such as “Hi Mum, running late” are no longer marked as scams.
Tools grouped by what you need, and PDF tools that keep working offline
The list of tools is now grouped by the job you came to do: check a message or an offer, protect your family, keep your details private, work with documents, everyday calculators, and tools for people who run a website. Tool names now start with the words people search for, such as redact PDF and fake job scam check. Some PDF tools, such as PDF to JPG, now keep working if the signal drops after the page opens.
Fill in and sign a PDF, PDF to Word, and help with email floods and driving data
Five more free tools that run on your own device: fill in and sign a PDF, copy a PDF’s text into a Word document, find the real email hidden in a flood of sign-ups, ask who has your driving data and a printable phone safety checklist to go through with an older relative. A guide explains how to tell if a debt collector is real, and the assistant plugin has three more checks.
Private PDF and photo tools, redaction guides and larger text
Six more free tools that work on your own device: merge PDF files, split, rotate and reorder pages, turn PDF pages into pictures, turn pictures into a PDF file, remove the location from photos and check a text message for scam signs. Seven guides answer questions people search for, from how to redact a PDF for free to privacy settings in AI assistants. Every page now has a Larger text button and a clearer footer, and Hide Names from AI recognises more street addresses, first names and bank numbers.
Free tool added: remove metadata from a PDF file
See the author, program, dates, comments, attachments and photo locations hidden inside a PDF file, then remove them. It runs in your browser and the file is not uploaded. Pages that answer one exact question now use the words people type: the black box around text in Google Docs, the California overtime calculator, the redaction checker and clicking a link in a text message. The Compress PDF page now explains what stays in the file.
Opinion for Cybersecurity Awareness Month
A safer online world starts with who is most at risk: the figures on who online criminals target most, and where help, free tools and reporting can do the most good.
Three new guides and worked examples
New guides: what to do after pasting private details into an artificial intelligence assistant, subscription renewals in the United Kingdom and European Union, with a letter to copy, and how big a file the tools can check. Three tools now show a worked example, Careful mode in Hide Names is described more clearly, the pricing page says prices are in United States dollars and links to how refunds work, and the free plugin now gives shorter answers.
Clearer wording for everyone
PDF now appears with its full name in brackets the first time it is used on each page. Release Check says how to check a file made in Apple Pages, Numbers or Keynote, or in Google Docs, Sheets or Slides, by exporting a copy first.
New guide: speaking to an artificial intelligence assistant
Five habits for talking to an assistant, and what ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude say they do with voice recordings. Also: Before You Pay now points to What to Do Next, Subscription Check explains what to do when you are charged for something you never agreed to, and Hide Names no longer mistakes the word Caller for a name.
New: UtilForge.org in your artificial intelligence assistant
A free plugin brings seven UtilForge checks into Claude: fake “verify you are human” commands, scam messages, payment pages, what to do next, hiding names and a family safe word. Your file stays on your device.
New free tool: Before You Paste a Command
A page says “verify you are human” and tells you to press keys and paste something? Check the writing or command for warning signs first. It never runs what you paste.
What to do next: a QR code, a phone call, a fake check or a link
Four situations and the first thing to do in each, with the free tools to use while you decide.
The full list of twenty-eight free tools
One page now lists every free tool on the site, with what each one does. Site Control’s five website tools are named on the pricing page, and the homepage and pricing page now describe UtilForge as free checks for everyday online choices.
One price, one licence, and Site Control is now free
Artificial Intelligence Tools for Work is $119 everywhere. Release Check is $29 for one person, and a team of up to ten gets it inside the $119 pack. Site Control’s five website tools are now a free download. Colleges, charities, public offices and people working alone can ask for a reduced price.
Password Habits Check, and five new guides
Six yes or no questions about password habits, set against the National Cybersecurity Alliance’s guidance, with nothing typed and nothing sent. New guides: strong passwords and password managers, turning on two-step login, taking part in Cybersecurity Awareness Month, a four-week plan for October, and a code of conduct for volunteers.
Two new guides, and the field guide grows
How to report a suspicious text or call in the United Kingdom, the United States and South Africa, and one rule to use before money moves. The Check first field guide now has a page on job offers and a page on reporting a text or call. The home page lists Before You Reply to a Recruiter.
Before You Reply to a Recruiter, and three guides
A free check for a message from a recruiter or an employer, with three guides: how to tell if a recruiter is real, what to do after sending identity to one, and a hiring promise that an organisation can publish.
A free Check first field guide to download
A PDF (Portable Document Format) file on the five moments to check first, with each page naming its sources and the date it was checked, a quick response code for every tool, and a card to fill in. No sign-up.
Three new guides: a family safe word, link checkers and testing a redacted PDF file
What a family safe word is and how to make one, what a link checker can and cannot tell you, and a way to test a redacted PDF file yourself.
Digital Safety Clinics: a free session plan
A 45-minute plan that care homes, libraries and community groups can run with UtilForge tools, with printable cards and ground rules for helpers.
New guide: I clicked a link in a text
What to do after tapping a link in a text, depending on what happened next, from NCSC and the Federal Trade Commission advice.
A free Check first card for readers
A one-page card to print or keep, with the five moments and what to do with a link or code in an unexpected message. It has a line to write in who to ask.
Easier to read on a phone
Small labels are larger, and the footer and logo links are taller to tap.
A free Check first poster, and a guide for teams
A one-page poster for a home, a classroom or a workplace shows the five moments to check first and has a line to write in who to ask. A new guide explains how a team can make the five moments a shared routine.
A safer online world: what UtilForge stands for
The home page, About and Press pages now say plainly why UtilForge exists. Every tool and several guides now open with a short answer to the question in the title. Two new guides: one on the three people-search websites that now show a court notice, and one on how to tell whether an online tool uploads your file.
Delete My Details: every removal link checked again
All the removal pages were checked again. Radaris, PeekYou and Pub360 no longer have removal forms because their websites were taken over by court order, so the list now says so. Five other entries pointed to pages that no longer exist and now point to the right ones: PublicRecordsNow, PrivateEye, Addresses.com, United Kingdom Phonebook and Sensis, which is now Thryv. CheckSecrets and MugshotLook now explain which of their two choices removes a listing.
Five new guides on money scams and artificial intelligence privacy
What to do when a relative phones asking for money, seven questions before an investment offer, how recovery scams work, what happens to what you paste into an artificial intelligence, and how to ask an artificial intelligence about real people without sharing their details.
One look across the tools, in plainer words
The older calculators and file tools now share the black-and-yellow look of the safety tools, with the words rewritten in plain language. Each tool page now answers questions such as who made it, whether it is a scam site, and what happens when you close the page. The cards on the home page are coloured by kind: money, privacy, documents and artificial intelligence.
Overtime Pay Calculator: salary mode updated
In salary mode the calculator divides the weekly salary (plus any bonus) by the hours worked, as the page says. Hourly mode is unchanged.
Add UtilForge to your home screen
A banner on the home page and a step-by-step page for iPhone, Android and computers, so UtilForge opens like an app with no app store. A new button saves every tool on the device so they work with no signal.
Questions answered on every safety tool
The fifteen safety tools now answer the questions people ask, in plain words, on the page: what it checks, what it cannot do, and that what you type stays on your phone or computer.
Easier to move between pages
Every page now shows where you are, and each tool links to related guides, related tools and the pages for your kind of work.
Email updates, if you want them
An optional sign-up for a note when a new tool is added or one is improved. This website still never asks for your email address: the sign-up is on Gumroad, which keeps it, and every email has an unsubscribe link.
Why get a pack?
The pricing page now shows side by side what the free tools, Family Safety Tools and artificial intelligence Tools for Work each include, and who each one is for.
Official help, country by country
A page that links to guidance from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the European Union Agency for Cybersecurity and to official reporting bodies in 20 countries and territories, for anyone who has lost money to fraud online. October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month in the United States and European Cybersecurity Month in Europe.
Private Files has been retired
Its tools, Redaction Studio, Compress PDF files and iPhone Photo Converter, are in Artificial Intelligence Tools for Work and Family Safety Tools.
Release Check
Checks PDF files, Word, Excel and PowerPoint files (including ones exported from Apple or Google apps) before release: words under black boxes, hidden sheets and rows, tracked changes, comments, speaker notes and author details. Free to check; $29 for the full version with exact locations, folders and a dated release record.
Artificial Intelligence Tools for Work and Family Safety Tools
Every tool in one download, arranged by team for organisations (from $39, with Release Check, the artificial intelligence use policy, staff training and a Public Office Supplement) or by need for families and students (pay what you want).
Subscription Check is more careful
Two shops at the same supermarket a month apart no longer count as a subscription. It now looks for the same amount each time, or a single price rise, the way subscriptions really charge.
The benchmark download is now 0.8 megabytes
It was 10.5 megabytes. The one large test file is now made on your own computer by the script that comes with it, so the benchmark downloads quickly on a phone.
Seven more kinds of work, and new warning signs
Tools for your work now covers publishers, public relations and communications, social media creators, tourism and travel, education technology, humanitarian organisations and fintech. Before You Pay now spots fake recruiters who move to WhatsApp, jobs that ask you to pay first, fake brand deals and holiday rentals that ask you to pay away from the booking site. Before You Buy a Course now spots “comment a keyword” sales, income requirements and pushy call bookings. Every tool on the homepage shows when to use it, and teams can ask about UtilForge in three short questions.
Five tools now say what they do
Swap and Return is now Hide Names from artificial intelligence, Check before you send it to an artificial intelligence is now Before You Paste into artificial intelligence, Did the black boxes work? is now Is It Really Blacked Out?, Omelette is now Sort My Saved-for-Later Reading, and the Take-Down Kit is now Delete My Details. Old links still work.
New free tool: Sort My Saved-for-Later Reading
Paste or open your newsletters, saved emails, bookmarks and notes, and get one document sorted by the topics you choose, with repeats removed, the rest set aside and a list of newsletters you could unsubscribe from.
Insurance brokers, accountants and property agents
New sections on Tools for your work for insurance and financial advice, accountants and bookkeepers, and property and letting agents, and a full page for insurance.
New free tool: Subscription Check
Paste your own bank statement, or type your subscriptions, to find every repeat payment, the yearly total, overlaps, price rises and payments nobody agreed to, and how to cancel.
Pages for healthcare, human resources and small businesses
What the tools do for healthcare staff, human resources and people teams and small businesses, and what they cannot do.
What’s new page and feed
This page and its feed, so you can follow new tools without giving anyone an email address.
New free tool: Before You Buy a Course
Check a money-making course, coaching offer, side hustle or trading academy for the warning signs consumer regulators describe, see how many sales it takes to earn the price back, and get help with a refund if you have already paid.
New free tool: Can I Afford This?
See what a loan, a credit card or buy now pay later really costs, plan your pay around your bills, compare two ways of paying off debts, and find free debt help where you live.
New free tool: Before You Invest
Check a trading app, crypto coin, forex course, loan or pension offer for the tricks financial regulators warn about, and find the official register of firms in your country.
Before You Pay now checks messages
Paste a text, email or WhatsApp that asks you to pay a fee, tap a link, send a code or move money, and it points out the signs of a scam.
Hide Names from artificial intelligence knows more kinds of numbers
Phone numbers, number plates, identity numbers and currencies from English-speaking countries across North America, the United Kingdom and Ireland, Australia and New Zealand, Europe and Africa, plus health, hotel room and booking numbers.
Tools for your work
How the tools help people in healthcare, legal work, retail, hospitality, colleges, universities, the arts, museums, journalism, charities, government, investing and families, and what they cannot do.
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This is optional. Nothing on utilforge.org asks for your email address, and the tools never send what you type anywhere. If you would like a note when a new tool is added or one is improved, you sign up on Gumroad, the service that takes payments and sends downloads for UtilForge. Gumroad keeps the address, it costs nothing, and every email has an unsubscribe link.
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