Author Topic: Safe websites to download free fonts from?  (Read 23659 times)

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Offline Misuzu

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Safe websites to download free fonts from?
« on: May 30, 2012, 08:03:55 PM »
Hello.

I know this question has probably been asked tons of times, and it's probably aggravatingly common to see this question on the internet, but... What font websites are safe to download fonts from? I hear some people say "this [website name] is safe" and others say "No [website name] is not safe!", so I'm not really sure.

Websites I'm considering downloading fonts from are DeviantArt.com or dafont.com.
Though I have the assumption that it may not matter which website it is, it matters who you're downloading your fonts from and whether they had viruses/malware at the time they uploaded the font for download?

I was also wondering how common it is to get malware from downloading fonts? For example, I hear that downloading free music is considered very risky and of course adult websites are usually malware-filled. Is downloading fonts as risky as downloading music, for example?

Anyway, I trust Avast members opinions much more than random people on Yahoo Answer or some other website, so I'd much prefer feedback from Avast members. :)
Thanks in advance!
Have a nice day and thanks for reading! :D
« Last Edit: May 30, 2012, 08:05:58 PM by Misuzu »
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Offline Pondus

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Re: Safe websites to download free fonts from?
« Reply #1 on: May 30, 2012, 08:38:51 PM »
you can check websites here

Zulu - http://zulu.zscaler.com/
Sucuri - http://sucuri.net/
URLVoid - http://urlvoid.com/

Offline bob3160

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Re: Safe websites to download free fonts from?
« Reply #2 on: May 30, 2012, 08:39:15 PM »
DiviantArt has always been a trustworthy site.

One of our old members SZC (Sasha) was active on there and may still be.
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Offline Coolmario88

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Re: Safe websites to download free fonts from?
« Reply #3 on: May 30, 2012, 08:49:08 PM »
I have used dafont.com and so far it seems safe to me.
OS: Windows 11 64-bit
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Offline Misuzu

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Re: Safe websites to download free fonts from?
« Reply #4 on: May 30, 2012, 09:23:08 PM »
Thanks for the fast replies everyone! :D

I'll give DeviantArt a shot first (I'm a lot more familiar with it) and maybe try out dafont later.


Thanks for the links by the way Pondus. :)
They'll save me some malware trouble I think.
In fact, I used Zulu to check out a DA font and it found the download for the fonts malicious.

Though, Zulu says that several user's IP (I think that's what it's called?) on DeviantArt are "risky" or have a "Suspicious pattern found", what does that mean? (Sorry I'm not knowledgeable about such things)

Best regards.
-Misuzu
« Last Edit: May 30, 2012, 09:47:44 PM by Misuzu »
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Offline bob3160

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Re: Safe websites to download free fonts from?
« Reply #5 on: May 30, 2012, 09:47:29 PM »
"Risky" are sights I'd stay away from. Nothing is worth taking a chance on a possible system infection.
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Offline Misuzu

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Re: Safe websites to download free fonts from?
« Reply #6 on: May 30, 2012, 09:49:05 PM »
Well Zulu found the IP adress (or whatever it's called) to be "risky", it also said that "Suspicious pattern found", but otherwise, nearly everything else was clean or "benign", as Zulu says. What I scanned was a font download deviation on DA.

I did download the font's ZIP folder and scanned it with VirusTotal.com and it came out clean, though, should I be concerned?

EDIT: Here's examples of what I'm talking about:
http://zulu.zscaler.com/submission/show/c9845bb1db2a5d42cea15030aa207875-1338408423
http://zulu.zscaler.com/submission/show/b8d7749379d40b0456185743baacb42e-1338408591

I downloaded both these fonts, for some reason at the time, I assumed they were safe?

In most cases, everything or almost everything is okay/clean except for a few "categories" under "Host Check". Does that mean the website/download has a risk of malware or the like? I sure hope I didn't download something bad.

Is what I downloaded not safe/malicious?
« Last Edit: May 30, 2012, 11:03:19 PM by Misuzu »
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Offline Misuzu

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Re: Safe websites to download free fonts from?
« Reply #7 on: May 30, 2012, 11:12:57 PM »
According to all the websites Pondus posted, as well as virustotal, this website is nearly completely safe:

hxxp://www.blambot.com/fonts.shtml
(I changed the 'http' to 'hxxp' just in case  ;))

It's also the website that uploaded one of the fonts I downloaded on dafont, so I'm assuming downloading said font was safe?

Sorry for all the trouble.

EDIT: It seemed that every deviation on DA that I analyzed with Zulu had some sort of "issue" with one or two of the "categories" under "Host Checks" (Such as "Netblock Size Risk"), so I decided to just analyze DeviantArt itself. Apparently it's DeviantArt itself that has the "Host Checks" problem, not necesarrily the deviation pages I've been analyzing. That makes me feel better, I thought I was running into tons of unsafe deviations due to bad luck.

Nonetheless, I've found what I'm looking for.
Thanks for your help everybody!
Bye for now! :D
~Misuzu
« Last Edit: May 31, 2012, 06:46:13 AM by Misuzu »
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