webmaster tools and links

Why in google's webmaster tools It says I have around 500 links, but when I type in google link:www.site.com I have only 2.
I personaly know that I have around 500 links like its stated in the webmaster tools. But why in the search engine i have only 2.
What is the answer to this big difference. My links are on cached pages so the problem is not in that the links are insignificant.
Or maybe it takes time to update it ?

 

Google does not like everybody to know about the exact backlinks. So they only show it for your own page via webmastertools.

 

That makes sense, I just hope the other links that are not showed are considered when making the rankings for the site.

 

I agree with Resident79 but another reason for this is google does
not count no-follow links while the other search engines do, to get
an accurate idea of how many backlinks you have you should use
yahoo site explorer.

 

Well, but in this case 99% of my links should be nofollow which is not true.

 

For me when searching from google, i get no links.
But my page is indexed by google, and i have refferences from other site, directories....