Anti-phishing extension or option for Gmail that works like this?
August 21, 2014 7:08 PM

I'm responsible for the IT for a small business, and I'm constantly worried that one of our users, despite my frequent warnings, will click on a gmail phishing link accidentally, perhaps in an early morning daze. I know that Google and some others (Netcraft and Wot) maintain blacklists, but I'm sure none of those have nearly perfect coverage. So I'm basically just looking for an extension or pre-existing option (that I might not know about) which warns the user clicking on an email link, unless the destination domain is on a whitelist.

I know if a user receives a lot of diverse email with diverse links then this type of blunt warning system would get tedious, but we don't. Thank you!
posted by grammalvsu to Computers & Internet (4 answers total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
Do your users use the gmail web interface, or do they use a desktop email client? If so, what browser or client do they use?
posted by Aleyn at 11:18 PM on August 21, 2014


If you can get them to use chrome as their default browser, and if you can expect them to heed a warning message, you might find this extension helpful:

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/netcraft-extension/bmejphbfclcpmpohkggcjeibfilpamia

Personally I've found that reminders and education work better than technical solutions. When I see some phishing emails get through our filters I send an email around to the staff advising them in case they saw it too. In quarterly meetings I try to emphasize *one* good common sense security idea and hope it sticks. I still need to sanitize a machine every few months but that is the way of things.
posted by dgran at 8:50 AM on August 22, 2014


OpenDNS might be able to help. Could you use them for your DNS services?
posted by Wild_Eep at 11:15 AM on August 22, 2014


Everyone uses Gmail in Chrome.

My understanding is that Netcraft uses the blacklist approach which wasn't quite what I was looking for -- but I agree, it could still help.

I'll consider OpenDNS. I'm guessing it's not possible to have it just restrict email links, but it could still be useful.

Thanks for the responses!
posted by grammalvsu at 11:54 AM on August 22, 2014


« Older What would the Kittah Monks name her?   |   Is Magnetic Fluid Conditioning legit? Newer »
This thread is closed to new comments.