Google has been working on a Chrome feature that warns users if they access a website that could be using phishing techniques. Called Lookalike URLs, the tool would detect if a user was entering a website that looked legitimate but had been nefariously modified. Bad actors use this technique to fool users into believing they are entering the correct site. Instead, the URL is mimicking a legitimate site. Microsoft has revealed Chromium Edge has now adopted the feature. It is available to preview testers on the Canary and Dev testing branches. It will be over a month before it is likely to pass through the Beta channel and even longer before it gets a full release. https://twitter.com/ericlaw/status/1232006426198990849 Previewers of the browser can check out Lookalike URLs by heading to Settings > Privacy and Services. However, whereas Chrome uses Google Search to find the correct URLs, Microsoft developer Eric Lawrence says Edge will leverage Bing.
Edge Canary Performance
Earlier this month, we reported on an improvement in Edge performance on the Canary channel. This development branch hosts the most unstable previews of Chromium Edge so performance is important. The optimizations have been enabled for 64-bit Windows 10 builds and require version 81.0.389.0 or higher. Microsoft says this will translate to a boost of 13% if you’re going by Speedometer 2.0 tests.
