Is dmoz.org legit or a scam?
DMOZ is a legitimate, historic web directory owned by Yahoo that currently serves as a static archive of the internet's early history.
Analysis Summary
No threats detected
All checks passed. This site appears legitimate — but always stay alert for phishing even on trusted domains.
Website Preview
Automated page render — captured in a safe sandbox. What an ordinary visitor would see when loading the site.
MT Intelligence
The domain has been registered for over 27 years and is currently managed by Yahoo IP Holdings. Our analysis confirms it is the original home of the Open Directory Project, which was a major volunteer-edited directory before closing in 2017. There are no detections from our antivirus network or major browser blocklists. The site does not attempt to harvest credentials or distribute software. It remains a safe, non-functional landing page for historical reference.
Web Research Findings
Our live research agent queries scam-report databases, consumer-review sites, news coverage, and general web search for dmoz.org, then cross-checks business-registration records and look-alike domain patterns. Everything below is pulled from what it actually found.
- dmoz.org was the official domain of DMOZ (Open Directory Project), a major volunteer-edited web directory launched in 1998 and owned by AOL (later Yahoo/Verizon).
- The active directory closed permanently on March 17, 2017, because AOL no longer wished to support the project; it became a landing page with links to static archives.
- Successor project is Curlie.org, which uses the DMOZ hierarchy and data.
- Domain remains actively registered (creation 1999-01-02, expires 2027-01-02) with name servers pointing to Yahoo infrastructure; Yahoo IP Holdings entity still owns it.
- Historical controversies included allegations of editor abuse, favoritism toward own sites, and complaints about ownership/editing practices, but no modern scam or fraud reports found.
- No evidence of phishing, malware distribution, or current malicious activity; searches for complaints, scam, or fraud return only historical SEO/discussion topics.
- Multiple mirrors and archives exist (e.g., odp.org, archive.org RDF dumps) preserving the pre-2017 directory data.
Registered since 1999-01-02, expires 2027-01-02. Owned by Yahoo IP Holdings entity (via AOL/Verizon/Yahoo corporate chain). Registrar: MarkMonitor Inc. Status includes client delete/transfer/update prohibited.
Antivirus Engines
Security Scans
Checked against the major public blocklists used by browsers and security tools — no hits.
Domain & Encryption
Server Reputation
Still, stay alert
No major threat indicators — but a clean scan does not guarantee every page is safe, and phishing emails routinely spoof real domains.
- Double-check the exact URL in your address bar
Confirm you are actually on dmoz.org and not a lookalike like d-moz.org.com or an IDN homoglyph.
- Use a password manager
Password managers only auto-fill on the exact domain they were saved for — they refuse to fill lookalike domains, which is the single best phishing defence.
- OpenDiscuss this site on the forum
If you have first-hand experience with this site — good or bad — share it with the MalwareTips community.
Reputation Sources
How this domain rates across independent threat-intelligence and blocklist providers.
Safety FAQ
Common questions about this site, answered directly from the scan data above — so the answers always reflect the latest verdict on this page.
- Our automated security review found no threat indicators on dmoz.org. The site appears legitimate based on the signals we checked, but always stay alert for phishing emails that spoof real domains.
- dmoz.org passed our automated security checks with a trust score of 89/100. No antivirus engines or major blacklists flagged the site at the time of the last scan.
- Yes. dmoz.org presents a valid TLSv1.3 certificate issued by DigiCert Inc · DigiCert Global G2 TLS RSA SHA256 2020 CA1, expiring in 111 days. Note that SSL only encrypts the connection — it does not guarantee that the site itself is trustworthy.
- dmoz.org is 27.5 years old, registered on 1/2/1999 through MarkMonitor Inc.. Scam domains are often freshly registered — a site under 6 months old warrants extra caution.
- No. All 93 antivirus engines in our malware network report dmoz.org as clean.
- No. dmoz.org is not currently listed on the major browser blocklist feeds that modern browsers use.
- dmoz.org resolves to an IP operated by Amazon.com, Inc. in US (usage type: Content Delivery Network). Hosting location alone doesn't make a site good or bad, but unusual geography for a brand's claimed country is one of many signals we weigh.
- This is a permanent record of the scan run on June 24, 2026. The verdict and evidence above reflect that scan and do not change on their own. If circumstances around dmoz.org have changed, MalwareTips staff can run a fresh scan, which re-runs every check from scratch and publishes an updated report.
User reviews & comments(0)
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