Google’s Safe Browsing program is now flagging 10,000 suspect websites per day, the search giant announced in a blog post. The information is used to deliver automated warnings to Chrome, Firefox and Safari users.
The search giant also announced a new, detailed section on its Transparency Report, which will focus on malware and phishing attacks.
“You can now learn how many people see Safe Browsing warnings each week, where malicious sites are hosted around the world, how quickly websites become reinfected after their owners clean malware from their sites, and other tidbits we’ve surfaced,” said software engineer Lucas Ballard in a post on Google’s Official Blog.
“Sharing this information also aligns well with our Transparency Report, which already gives information about government requests for user data, government requests to remove content, and current disruptions to our services,” said Ballard.
“Google's Safe Browsing is a very useful layer of protection for web users (not just Chrome users - the technology is used by Firefox and Safari too), and I applaud their efforts,” says ESET Senior Research Fellow David Harley.
“However, there are plenty of malicious sites and other vectors out there - our lab processes several hundred thousand threats per day, and they don't all come from those 10,000 web sites. So while Google's Transparency Report statistics may prove interesting and useful - and no doubt have some PR value - end users should continue to be vigilant and take care in selecting which sites they visit.”
