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.