Google announced the expansion of an Android protection trial against financial scams that exploit phone calls and screen sharing. The feature warns users when they open a participating financial app while screen sharing and talking with a number not saved in their contacts. The protection gives users the option to end the call and stop screen sharing with one tap, while imposing a 30-second waiting period before they can continue.
The feature targets scam methods in which criminals impersonate a bank or trusted institution and then try to persuade victims to share their phone screens to access banking information or carry out a financial transfer. Google says scammers continue to develop social-engineering techniques to convince users to visit malicious websites, disclose sensitive data, send money, or download harmful apps.
How the protection works during a call
The warning appears when three conditions are met simultaneously: a participating financial app is running, the phone screen is being shared, and the user is on a call with a number not saved in their contacts. Rather than leaving the decision to the user at a moment when a scammer may be creating a sense of urgency and panic, the interface displays a risk alert and allows the user to stop the call and screen sharing.
The 30-second waiting period adds a time barrier before allowing the user to proceed. According to Google, the delay is designed to help break the influence of social-engineering techniques and disrupt the false sense of urgency scammers use to manipulate victims.
Expanding the trial to additional banks and apps
Google launched the trial earlier this year in the United Kingdom and said the protection helped thousands of users end calls that could have cost them significant amounts of money. Following these results, the company expanded the protection to cover most major banks in the United Kingdom, alongside trials it recently launched with financial apps in Brazil and India.
Google has also begun testing the protection with additional types of apps, including peer-to-peer, or P2P, payment apps. The new step represents the launch of a trial in the United States with several fintech companies and banks, including Cash App and JPMorganChase. The rollout for users in the United States begins on the versions of the apps designed for the U.S. market in December 2025.
Scope and compatibility
The protection is compatible with devices running Android 11 or later, but it depends on the financial app participating in the trial. Google also explained that the U.S. rollout is limited to users of the U.S. versions of the participating apps, meaning the feature is not automatically available for every financial app or in all markets.
The move is part of Google’s broader efforts to combat fraud on Android through calls, text messages, and chat notifications in messaging apps. The company cited a YouGov survey commissioned by Google and conducted during July and August that included 5,100 people, with 1,700 participants in each of the United States, Brazil, and India. The survey results indicated that Android users were 58% more likely than iOS users to report that they had not received any scam messages during the previous week, among users of the default messaging app on their phones.
Google confirmed that it will continue working with different organizations across the ecosystem, with the aim of learning from current trials and expanding these safeguards to more users in the future.