Google strengthens Gmail security with optical character recognition for attachments

In conjunction with its appearance at the RSA security conference in San Francisco tomorrow, Google announced today that it’s rolling out security enhancements for Gmail. Perhaps the most interesting one is bringing optical character recognition for attachments, such as images and copies of documents. That way, businesses will be able to pick up on the transfer of sensitive information and respond appropriately.

The feature is an addition to the data loss prevention (DLP) feature of Gmail, which became available to Google Apps Unlimited Customers in December. Google Apps admins can use the new feature in association with the content compliance and objectionable content settings in the admin console, a Google spokesperson told VentureBeat.

Google is also rolling out more granular DLP tools, as Google vice president for security and privacy engineering Gerhard Eschelbeck wrote in a blog post.

“Finally, new predefined detectors offer broader coverage of HIPAA data and personally identifiable information (PII) globally,” Eschelbeck wrote.

Google continues to add to Gmail, which makes sense as it has more than 1 billion users. Enterprise-focused features like this should help the application became more widely adopted in enterprises.