Google has updated Gmail with new security features to combat spams and phishing messages. The features include early phishing detection using machine learning, click-time warnings for malicious links, and unintended external reply warnings.
Google claims machine learning has helped Gmail achieve more than 99% accuracy in spam detection. The latest update also strengthens protection against malicious attachments in Gmail. The email client from Google is using a dedicated machine learning model that selectively delays emails (less than .05 percent of messages on average) to perform rigorous phishing analysis. Last month, more than 100 crore Google Docs users were hit by a major phishing attack which arrived in users inbox posing as an email from a trusted contact and asked users to check a Docs file.
Google says it now correlates spam signals with attachment and sender heuristics, to predict messages containing new and unseen malware variants. These protections enable Gmail to better protect our users from zero-day threats, ransomware and polymorphic malware. In 2015, Google had launched Safe Browsing security feature to Chrome on Android.
The rise in malware and phishing attack is on a rise with recent examples being WannaCry ransomware and Judy Android malware.