Both in the Android app and on the web, 9to5Google discovered that Gmail users are being urged to enable Google's Enhanced Safe Browsing

An information box appears above the inbox of users checking Gmail, promising "additional protection from phishing"

"Turning on Enhanced Safe Browsing provides additional protection from dangerous emails Users can dismiss this prompt by clicking or tapping "No thanks"" Clicking "Continue" will take the user to this page in their account, where they can enable it

Enhanced Safe Browsing, first introduced in 2020 and improved a year later, runs in the background in both Gmail and Chrome and proves real-time web protection

When enabled, Enhanced Safe Browsing monitors for dangerous URLs, downloads, browser extensions, and more Google claims that those with Enhanced Safe Browsing enabled are phished 35% less often than those without it

Websites check "uncommon URLs" against a list in real time to reduce the probability of being hit by phishing sites For suspicious downloads, Google gives registered users the option to upload files to Google's servers for a more thorough check For browser extensions, those created by developers who do not follow Google's Developer Program Policy include an option to check what permissions they have, so they can make their own risk assessment of possible damage

None of this is mandatory, so Google can be overrun at any time The idea, however, is to make users think a little more carefully about blindly clicking on links or downloading potentially dangerous files

Signing up for the program would also help with broader cybersecurity efforts According to Google, it will send "small samples of pages, downloads, extension activity, and system information in order to discover new threats"

However, those concerned about privacy may be put off by the fact that "we temporarily link this data to your Google account when you log in" to "protect users across Google apps"

The mobile version of the prompt currently appears only on Android, but Chrome for iOS also supports Enhanced Safe Browsing as of last year

If you don't see the prompt but would like to register, it's very easy: log in to your Google account and turn on this option, or you can enable it in Chrome's settings at the following address: chrome://settings/ security