Google Starts Showing Suspicious File Alerts in Docs, Sheets, and Slides

Displaying banners to warn users about suspicious files (which may contain viruses, malicious links) is one of Google Drive's well-known security features, and has proven effective in practice.

Displaying banners to warn users about suspicious files (which may contain viruses, malicious links) is one of Google Drive's well-known security features, and has proven effective in practice. Therefore, it is not surprising that Google is planning to bring this feature to the Docs, Sheets, and Slides toolkit, to give users a more secure and secure environment.

Specifically, in a new post on the Google Workspace blog, the Mountain View company has confirmed that it will soon bring Drive's file-level security feature to Docs, Sheets, and Slides. Essentially, this means that every file in Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides is eligible to receive and display a security warning banner if Google's internal malware scanner suspects it may cause damage. harm the user's computer.

In the near future, nearly all Google Workspace users will see warning banners when they open suspicious Google Docs, Sheets, or Slides files on the web. One of the most common warning labels that users may encounter are:

'This file looks suspicious. It might be used to steal your personal information' - 'This file looks suspicious. Can be used to steal your personal information".

This is said to be a necessary move by Google in the context of the rapidly expanding Google Workspace user base in recent years, making this toolkit an attractive 'destination' for hackers.

In fact, recent reports show that cybercriminals have been strongly targeting users through Google's office software. Research from the CheckPoint security team has found that cybercriminals are abusing the document comments section in the Google Workspace app to distribute malicious links to users. Even macOS users are not immune to similar attacks. Some types of malware can even take control of the victim's Google Drive account.

Google Starts Showing Suspicious File Alerts in Docs, Sheets, and Slides Picture 1 Google Starts Showing Suspicious File Alerts in Docs, Sheets, and Slides Picture 1

Banners for file-level security alerts are now available to all Google Workspace users and legacy G Suite Basic and Business customers. This feature will also be rolling out to personal Google Workspace accounts in the near future.

Microsoft already has a similar warning and protection system in place for the Microsoft 365 platform. In fact, the offline version of Microsoft Office even disables basic editing as well as macros for all MS Office files that are stored. download from the internet to ensure the safety of users.