Chrome: Malicious Webs Blocked And Suspicious Webs Flagged

On June 18, there were two security features updated on Google Chrome including a tool allowing users to report suspicious webs, and a warning about webs’ addresses that use substitute characters suspiciously. These new features augment Google Safe Browsing which is installed in Gmail, Android, Chrome as well as improving the services that are designed to prevent users from using malicious webs.

The product manager of Google Chrome - Emily Schechter stated in a blog that the substituted characters detecting tool functions based on the comparison between the text in a web link that you are clicking with that of similar web links visited before. The new feature is said to be released along with the new Google's browser version 75.

Suspicious Site Reporter, which is newly released as a Google Chrome add-on, will allow users to report websites that seem to be harmful to Google. Immediate changes will not be seen, however, similar to reporting spam emails in Gmail, users’ actions play an important part in creating crowdsourced data helping Google and users using Google Safe Browsing.

Google Chrome’s changes are supposed to be modest improvements. However, StatCounter analytics firm stated that even the smallest changes can impact numerous activities online due to the fact that Chrome is one of the most popular website browsers with 63 percent of website usage every day.

The service provided by Google Safe Browsing can also be used by other rival browsers and organizations since it updates, compiles and lists out suspicious sites.

In 2007, Google Safe Browsing is said to have 3 billion protected devices, however, the number of devices, which are protected by this feature, has increased to 4 billion in 2019.