Although it cannot completely prevent phishing scams, Google is working hard to make these scam emails easier to be screened. In an article published last week, Google stated that it has introduced a new security feature for Gmail-the Certified Mail Brand Identity (BIMI). It is an industry-standard designed to bring stronger sender authentication to the email ecosystem.
In July last year, Google announced the launch of the BIMI pilot program, and now it is finally ready to be put into use. The design of the certified brand logo is that when an organization sends you an e-mail certified using the DMARC standard, the organization’s logo will be displayed in your inbox to help reduce the possibility of you opening and operating e-mails that pretend to be legitimate sources.
Ideally, a certified brand identity functions like a verification badge you might see on a social network, telling you that an account is actually owned and operated by the entity it claims to represent. For this feature, Google’s official description is:
Organizations that use the Sender Policy Framework (SPF) or Domain Key Identified Mail (DKIM) to authenticate their emails and deploy DMARC can provide Google with their verified trademark identification through the Verification Mark Certificate (VMC). BIMI uses trademark verification agencies, such as certification agencies, to verify trademark ownership and provide verification certificates in VMC. Once these verified emails pass our other anti-abuse checks, Gmail will begin to display the logo in the existing avatar slot.
