Google now lets you add friends as contacts for account recovery | TechCrunch

Google is announcing new privacy and recovery tools to combat spam across multiple products related to Android, including suspicious link detection in messages, sign-in with phone number, and recovery contacts.

Google is adding new ways to recover Google accounts without losing any information in case you lose your device or if your account is compromised through a hack.

The company is adding a new feature called Recovery Contacts, which lets you add your trusted friends or family members as contacts to initiate your recovery and verify your identity. When you are locked out of your account because you lost your device or forgot your password. This setting is under the security tab on your Google Accounts page.

When you are locked out, you can select a recovery contact as the backup method, and they will get a number, which will be valid for 15 minutes, that you will have to verify to log in to your account again. You can add 10 recovery contacts to your account, and they will have to approve your request to be added as one. Once you add a recovery contact, you can’t use them again for seven days.

The company is also adding sign-in with mobile number as a recovery method, which is particularly helpful when you lose a device. The tool automatically identifies all accounts linked with a particular phone number. You can use your lock-screen passcode or pattern from the previous device to verify yourself. This feature is gradually rolling out worldwide.

The company launched on-device protection for messages for Pixel devices to detect scam and spam messages. Google is now baking in spam link detection in Google Messages for all users. When you click on a suspicious message, the app will warn you and stop you from visiting that page.

For more technically inclined people, the company is adding a key verifier in Google Messages. This helps identify the other person and ensures that your messages are end-to-end encrypted and private. Users with Android 10 and later can scan a QR code for your contact for verification.

Google is also introducing a new game called Be Scam Ready to educate users about different fraud and scam use cases.