Google Chrome Safe Browsing Feature Updated With Real-Time Privacy-Preserving URL Protection
Google Chrome offers users a Safe Browsing feature that checks for malicious URLs before loading web pages, and the search giant has now given it a major upgrade — a privacy-preserving real-time link scanning mechanism that checks an encrypted version of links that a user is visiting via an independently operated server. While the company claims that the ‘standard’ version of the browser’s Safe Browsing feature is much more effective at detecting threats, the ‘enhanced’ version will still be more effective against specific threats. The company stated in a blog post that it was upgrading the standard version of the Safe Browsing feature with a real-time protection protocol that it claims is much more effective at protecting users from unsafe sites. Until now, the standard Safe Browsing mode would check for malicious websites from a list that was regularly downloaded onto a user’s smartphone or computer — the upgrade will now allow Google to check for dangerous URLs via a third-party server. Google says that when you visit a website, Chrome will check the locally …