Chrome adds new warnings and cloud scanning for suspicious downloads

Google has updated the suspicious file warnings Chrome displays for why it might have blocked a potentially suspicious or dangerous file download to hopefully give users clearer explanations. For people who turn on the anti-phishing Enhanced protection feature, opting in to upload suspicious files for scanning in the cloud, it’s also shifted to automatic scans, saying files sent for deep scans are 50 times more likely to be marked as malware.

In response to widespread targeted cookie theft attacks on YouTube channels and other groups, like the Linus Tech Tips hacker takeover last year, Chrome has also added a prompt to scan encrypted archive files such as .zip files that have a password. Users will be prompted to enter the password so its AI system will open and scan them in the cloud for Enhanced protection users, while people with the default settings will have the files scanned locally using the currently available malware definitions.

The new changes are live in the current Chrome releases.

For the labels most of us are more likely to see while browsing the internet normally, Google says its warnings will be divided into “suspicious” or “dangerous” categories, depending on the level of confidence its AI models have in the level of risk. Users shown the new warnings have ignored warnings less frequently and acted on them more quickly, according to a press release Google shared with The Verge.