Internet file safety information center

Systems and methods to enhance safety of computer file distribution. The system includes a computer network, a server computer connected to said computer network one or more electronic records stored in the server computer wherein each record includes information about a particular file and is indexed by a hash value computed from the particular file and at least one user terminal connected to the computer network. The user terminal is operable to verify the authenticity of a particular file including computing the hash value of the particular file and retrieving from the server computer the electronic record that contains information about the particular file including submitting the computed hash to the server computer.