As more of our lives move online, protecting our internet presence has become very important. This is why many companies have started to include more security features in their software and services, and more recently Google has announced that its Safe Browsing feature will now be integrated into Android apps’ WebView by default.This was originally announced by Google back in December 2017, but basically what has changed from then and now is that Safe Browsing has been enabled by default. According to Google, “Developers of Android apps using WebView no longer have to make any changes to benefit from this protection. Safe Browsing in WebView has been available since Android 8.0 (API level 26), using the same underlying technology as Chrome on Android.”
So what is Safe Browsing? Basically if you use Chrome to browse the web, there might be an instance or two where you surf to a malicious website by accident, in which you will then be greeted with a warning screen (see screenshot to the right) informing you about it and preventing users from going further.
By integrating it into WebView on Android, it means that even apps are protected with Safe Browsing and not just on the Chrome browser, bringing an additional layer of protection to users.
Filed in . Read more about Android, Apps, Google and Security.