Gmail to sound alarm if account's been hacked

 

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By Stuart Turton

Posted on 25 Mar 2010 at 08:42

Gmail will now warn users if it thinks their accounts have been compromised.

Back in July, Google added account login information to the foot of inboxes, detailing the location, time and IP address from when the account was last accessed.

The company's now taking this further with an automated service that will alert users if it believes something suspicious is going on.

"To determine when to display this message, our automated system matches the relevant IP address, logged per the Gmail privacy policy, to a broad geographical location," explained Pavni Diwanji, Gmail's engineering director.

"While we don't have the capability to determine the specific location from which an account is accessed, a login appearing to come from one country and occurring a few hours after a login from another country may trigger an alert," he added.

The warning will be accompanied by a "details" link offering a complete list of recent logins, and a link to change your password details.

The service follows Google's claim that Chinese hackers infiltrated the Gmail accounts of human-rights activists and dissidents in December. The action has caused Google to relocate its Chinese servers from the mainland to Hong Kong, and stop censoring its search results in the country.