Google Chrome now lets you flag sketchy websites

Google Chrome now lets you flag sketchy websites

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CNN — Google Chrome has a new extension that lets people report sketchy websites commonly used by phishers or scammers.

People can download the free new tool, called the "Suspicious Site Reporter," from the Chrome Web Store. It will appear as an orange flag on the right of the Chrome browser.

If a website seems suspicious, for example, an unfamiliar website is asking for personal information or trying to download something without permission, a person can click the orange flag and report it to Google. The color of the flag will also change if Google suspects a website is suspicious.

Google will compile reports in its Safe Browsing database of dangerous websites.

"Google Safe Browsing helps protect over four billion devices every day from threats like phishing and malware by showing warnings to users when they attempt to navigate to dangerous sites or download dangerous files," the company said in the extension's page.

The new tool is the latest extension Google developed to protect people while browsing the web.

Google in February released a Chrome extension called Password Checkup, a tool that lets users know when their login information has been exposed or compromised.

Google cross-checks the login credentials against a regularly updated database of more than four billion username and password entries that it has collected from sources such as password dumps.

Hackers responsible for data breaches on sites like Yahoo or LinkedIn sometimes post large databases of people's usernames and passwords online. Because many people use the same passwords across sites, bad actors could try to use the information to gain access to other accounts.

The-CNN-Wire™ & © 2018 Cable News Network, Inc., a Time Warner Company. All rights reserved.

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