14 DAY TRIAL // The messages in Google’s web browser warning users of the dangers of accessing a certain page presenting a security risk are to be changed, as the company experiments with new ones.
Google security engineer Adrienne Porter Felt announced on Twitter at the end of last week that the Chrome Canary and Dev channels now use different pages to alert users of the potential threats and advise them to tread carefully to the shady parts of the web.
Both of them have an all-red background, a color that cannot possibly go unnoticed. In the case of a phishing attack, the dialog informs of the danger of information theft such as passwords or credit card details.
The warning for malware provides more info of the perils ahead, like the risk of surreptitious installation of malicious programs that could lead to loss of sensitive information.
If the fresh modification follows the regular development cycle (Canary>Dev>Beta>Stable) users may see the new dialogs in the stable Chrome version released in October. However, the developer may choose to push them sooner.
Although some may not view this as an improvement, Felt explains that the combination of the red color with the word “ahead” is actually designed to calm the fears of the user that faces the warning.
She said that “people see warnings & think attack has already happened. word 'ahead' fixes that fear.” However, these are only the initial variants of the messages and changes are likely to appear until the perfect formula is found.
the newest @googlechrome malware warnings are now on Canary and Dev channels if you want to check em out pic.twitter.com/9uMyCYrbF4
— Adrienne Porter Felt (@__apf__) July 11, 2014