Google Safe Browsing helps keep you safe while you surf the web by identifying phishing, malware, scams and other online threats in real time. Launched in 2005, it’s used by Chrome and many other popular browsers, Search, Android, Google Ads and Gmail to keep 5 billion devices safe and help you stay one step ahead of cybercriminals.

In 2020, we launched the Enhanced Protection mode of Safe Browsing in Chrome to better address the increasingly sophisticated threats people face online. And now, more than 1 billion Chrome users are using this mode, making them two times as safe from phishing and other scams when compared to Safe Browsing’s Standard Protection mode. Today, in honor of Safer Internet Day, here’s a look at how Enhanced Protection mode works to keep you out of danger online.

If you turn on Enhanced Protection, much of the additional protection you receive comes from advanced AI and machine learning models designed to spot dangerous URLs engaging in known phishing, social engineering and scam techniques. These models are trained to distinguish between real and malicious websites based on millions of real-world examples.