Gmail app for Android now blocks phishing attacks
Google has added an anti-phishing security check on its Gmail app for Android, the company announced Wednesday.
From now on, the Gmail app will give you an additional warning when you click on a suspicious link in an email.
"The site you are trying to visit has been identified as a forgery, intended to trick you into disclosing financial, personal or other sensitive information," the text of the warning says, along with the option to continue to the link at your own peril, and report an incorrect warning.
The new feature, which will be gradually rolled out to all Gmail users over the next days, comes shortly after a widespread phishing attack that impersonated Google services hit a large number of users.
It's unclear, however, whether the new Gmail security check would've stopped that particular attack, which uses a fake Google Docs app that actually resided on Google's web domain. Google, however, has taken steps to mitigate that phishing scam by removing the fake pages, disabling the offending accounts and adding steps to prevent this type of attack from happening again.
In any case, this update could not come at a better time; as phishing attacks get more sophisticated, they're getting increasingly hard to recognize, even for experienced users.
Topics Google
Stan is a Senior Editor at Mashable, where he has worked since 2007. He's got more battery-powered gadgets and band t-shirts than you. He writes about the next groundbreaking thing. Typically, this is a phone, a coin, or a car. His ultimate goal is to know something about everything.
