In a bid to tighten those loosen strings and put up a firm defence against internet attacks, Google has introduced a new feature in Gmail, that sends out a warning to its users whenever an email is received from an unencrypted source.
In particular, Google has introduced this feature to curb the internet attacks taking place between two email providers. Google has noted that the security of its user’s data is more vulnerable when they receive a message sent through a different email provider.
Nicolas Lidzborski, Gmail Security Engineering Lead posted that
We’re constantly working to help make email more secure for everyone. These efforts are reflected in security protections like default HTTPS in Gmail as well as our Safer Email Transparency report, which includes information about email security beyond just Gmail.
Google already has certain security measures in place, like for instance, Gmail strictly relies on an HTTPS connection for communication between a browser and its servers. But whenever a mail is sent and received between two different email providers, the message is left unencrypted, making it vulnerable for attacks. With the introduction of this feature, Gmail aims to warn its users from opening a message that is unencrypted.
Currently Gmail encrypts 57 percent of messages received from other email providers, whereas conversations taking place between Gmail accounts is encrypted at all times.
To that end, in partnership with the University of Michigan and the University of Illinois, we’re publishing the results of a multi-year study that measured how email security has evolved since 2013. While Gmail was the foundation of this research, the study’s insights apply to email more broadly, not unlike our Safer Email Transparency report. It’s our hope that these findings not only help make Gmail more secure, but will also be used to help protect email users everywhere as well.
The new feature is the latest measure employed by Google to make Gmail safer than ever before. Last year, it came up with the password alert feature that warned users when they or someone tried to log in to their account from untrusted site. It was almost three years ago that Google rolled out its new feature that warns users of a suspected state-sponsored attack. Gmail also drops in a mail whenever an account is logged in from a new device.