Get enhanced spam protection through automatic labeling of suspected spam calls in Google Voice
To help protect you from unwanted calls and potentially harmful scams, Google Voice will now show a “suspected spam caller” label on all calls that Google believes to be spam. | Available to all Google Voice customers | Learn more.
The new labels appear on the incoming call screen and in the user’s call history. Users can either:
Confirm a suspected spam call, which causes future calls from that number to go directly to voicemail and call history entries to be put in the spam folder
Mark a labeled call as not spam, after which the suspected spam label is never displayed for that number again
Get an alert that an incoming call is suspected spam
Getting started
Admins: There is no admin control for this feature.
End users: Suspected spam labeling appears automatically when the Voice spam filter setting (Settings > Security > Filter spam) is OFF. When spam filtering is ON, all calls that Google identifies as spam are automatically sent to voicemail, and the call entry is put into the spam folder. Visit the Help Center to learn more about blocking calls and messages or marking them as spam.
The announcements below were published on the Workspace Updates blog earlier this week. Please refer to the original blog posts for complete details.
Updated experience for exporting your organization’s data
We’re introducing new capabilities for exporting your organization’s data, giving our customers greater flexibility over managing their organization’s data export needs. | Available to Google Workspace Enterprise Plus, Education Standard, and Education Plus customers only. | Learn more.
Google Voice Standard customers can assign phone numbers in other Voice countries in their region
Google Voice customers on the Standard subscription in Canada, Europe and the US can assign phone numbers to any supported country in their region:
Customers in Europe can assign phone numbers in supported European countries
Customers in Canada and the US can assign phone numbers in both countries
This change gives our customers on the Standard SKU the flexibility to deploy Voice across the different countries they operate in within the same region. | Available for Google Voice Standard customers only. | Learn more.
More filter effects available for Google Meet
Google Workspace users can now access a variety of new filter effects on Google Meet on the web and mobile. These filters, such as loghead, strawberry, and working bunny, can help bring an element of fun to meetings. | Learn more.
Quickly refine search results in Google Chat with search chips
We’re expanding an existing mobile feature to the web that helps you find exactly what you’re looking for much faster using search chips that filter your search results. | Learn more.
The filters available to help you find messages are:
From: Messages sent from specific people.
Said in: Messages said in a specific conversation or space.
Date: Messages sent during a specific date range.
Has file: Messages that include documents, spreadsheets, slides, and more.
Has link: Messages that include links.
Mentions me: Messages that mention you.
Getting started
Admins: There is no admin control for this feature.
End users:
To find a specific message with the help of search filter chips: type your keyword(s) in the search bar in chat.google.com or Chat mobile app > hit enter.On the search results page, you can see the filter chips above the results > click on a filter chip to apply the filter on the search results.
For Chat in Gmail, type your keyword(s) in the search bar > navigate to the “messages” tab on the search results page > you can see the filter chips above the results > click on a filter chip to apply the filter on the search results.
Admins can control whether these effects are on or off for their users — by default, this setting is:
OFF for Google Workspace Education users.
ON by default for all other Google Workspace editions, including Google Workspace Individual users.
Getting started
Admins: To control availability of these effects, navigate to Apps > Google Workspace > Settings for Google Meet > Meet video settings in the Admin console. Visit the Help Center to learn more about how to control whether users can change their backgrounds in Meet.
Available to Google Workspace Enterprise Plus, Education Standard, and Education Plus customers
Not available to Google Workspace Essentials, Business Starter, Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Essentials, Education Fundamentals, Frontline, and Nonprofits, as well as legacy G Suite Basic and Business customers
Google Workspace already uses the latest cryptographic standards to encrypt all data at rest and in transit between our facilities. Client-side encryption helps strengthen the confidentiality of your data while helping to address a broad range of data sovereignty and compliance needs.
Client-side encryption is already available for Google Drive, Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides, Google Meet, and Google Calendar (beta).
Getting started
Admins:
Eligible Workspace customers can apply for the beta after completing a few steps to prepare your account.
This feature will be OFF by default and can be enabled at the domain, OU, and Group levels (Admin console > Security > Access and data control > Client-side encryption). Visit the Help Center to learn more about client side encryption.
End users: To add client-side encryption to any message, click the lock icon and select additional encryption, and compose your message and add attachments as normal. Visit the Help Center to learn more about using Client-side encryption for Gmail.
Rollout
We will be accepting beta applications and allowlisting customers over the next several weeks.
Availability
Available to Google Workspace Enterprise Plus, Education Plus, and Education Standard customers
Not available to Google Workspace Essentials, Business Starter, Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Essentials, Education Fundamentals, Frontline, and Nonprofits, as well as legacy G Suite Basic and Business customers
Not available to users with personal Google Accounts
In January 2022, we announced the general availability of translated captions in Google Meet. Translated captions provide real-time translations of the speaker's language, helping to make meetings more inclusive and collaborative for meeting participants.
We’re expanding on this feature and beginning today, you can:
Translate English calls into Japanese, Mandarin (simplified), and Swedish
Translate French, German, Portuguese, and Spanish calls into English
Additionally, standard captions are now available in Japanese, Russian, Italian, Korean, Dutch, Portuguese, Mandarin (traditional). Visit the Help Center for a complete list of available languages.
Some languages will include a “Beta” tag as we continue to optimize performance and introduce additional languages over time. We will continue to provide updates on the Workspace Updates blog as more languages become available.
Getting started
Admins: There is no admin control for this feature.
End users: This feature will be available by default. Visit the Help Center to learn more about captions and translated captions in Google Meet.
Meeting participants:
You can use live translated captions if the meeting is organized by a user with an eligible Google Workspace edition.
Available for meetings organized by Google Workspace Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Starter, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education Plus, and the Teaching and Learning Upgrade
Captions
Available to all Google Workspace customers, as well as legacy G Suite Basic and Business customers
Now when admins receive these notifications, they’ll also be captured in the Alert Center in the admin console. This will help make it easier for admins to stay on top of important communications from Google.
Getting started
Admins:
Admins with the Alert Center privilege will see these notifications in the Alert center. Primary admins will also receive these notifications via email
We’re adding a new smart canvas feature that makes this process much easier by enabling you to format and display code in Docs with code blocks.
Who’s impacted
End users
Why you’d use it
This feature gives you the ability to visualize code with industry standards, making code readable and collaboration much easier.
Getting started
Admins: There is no admin control for this feature.
End users: To format and display code in a Doc, select Insert > Building blocks > Code blocks > choose your programming language or search @ > Code blocks > choose your programming language. Visit the Help Center to learn more about inserting smart chips & building blocks in your Google Doc.
Rollout pace
Rapid Release domains: Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility) starting on December 14, 2022
Scheduled Release domains: Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility) starting on January 3, 2023
Availability
Available to Google Workspace Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education Standard, Education Plus customers and Nonprofits
Not available to Google Workspace Essentials, Business Starter, Enterprise Essentials, Education Fundamentals, the Teaching and Learning Upgrade, Frontline, as well as legacy G Suite Basic and Business customers
Not available to users with personal Google Accounts
Faceting support for integer type fields, such as priority levels for support tickets or the number of pages in a document
Out of the box Faceting support for document size, document creation, and custom date fields
New default reserved operators for document size and created date fields
Simplified Query API response with filters being directly provided in the response
Expanding filter options creates a more user friendly search experience, making it easier and faster to narrow search results to the most relevant documents.
Getting started
Admins and developers: See our developer documentation for more information about using new facet enhancements
End users: There is no end user action required. You will automatically see new filter options once your admin has configured them
Pin table headers when using pageless format on Google Docs
When your Google Doc is set to the pageless format, you can now pin one or more table rows as header rows. When you scroll vertically past the top of the table, the headers will remain visible at the top of the window until you scroll to the bottom of the table. | Learn more.
Easily share files in Google Meet chat on web
Currently, when you share the link to a Google Drive file in Meet chat, you have to ensure the document is shared with those on the call, either proactively or reactively, on a separate screen. Starting this week, when sharing a file in Meet chat, you will now be prompted to update the file sharing permissions to reflect which meeting attendees you’d like to have access to a particular file, all within Meet. | Roll out to Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains began December 5, 2022 at an extended pace (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility). | Learn more.
Warning banners for external email recipients on iOS devices
Beginning today, you'll see a warning banner when adding external recipients to an email on iOS. These warnings are already available for Gmail on the web and Android devices. Note that admins can turn these specific warning labels on or off for their organization. | Roll out to Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains began December 9, 2022 at an extended pace (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility).
Improvements for using Miro in Google Meet
We've made two enhancements for the Miro experience within Google Meet:
Meeting participants will see a dialog invite instead of a chat message asking them to join a whiteboarding session.
Meeting hosts now have the option to end collaboration for the group as a whole. Alternatively, meeting participants will have the ability to leave the session individually.
We hope these improvements create a smoother collaborative experience when using Miro within Google Meet. | Learn more here and here.
Previous announcements
The announcements below were published on the Workspace Updates blog earlier this week. Please refer to the original blog posts for complete details.
More ways to prevent data exfiltration on iOS devices
In 2020, we released several data exfiltration protections for iOS devices. Today, we’re announcing the next set of enhancements for data exfiltration protections for iOS. We’re expanding these security controls to give admins more ways to protect sensitive company data on iOS devices. | Available to Google Workspace Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Enterprise for Education, and Cloud Identity Premium customers only. | Learn more.
New default setting for content managers to modify shared drives coming in February 2023
Starting this week, admins will see a new shared drive setting that can be enabled or disabled to give content managers the ability to share folders in shared drives. In February 2023, all content managers will have the ability to share folders by default. If you’d like this feature to remain off for end users, disable the setting now. | Available to Google Workspace Essentials, Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Essentials, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education Fundamentals, Education Plus, Education Standard, the Teaching and Learning Upgrade, and Nonprofits, as well as legacy G Suite Business customers only. | Learn more.
Create drop-down chips in Google Sheets
We’ve added dropdown chips in Google Sheets, a custom formatting feature that is already available in Docs. They also enable you to easily indicate statuses or various project milestones outlined in your Sheet. | Learn more.
Collaborate with colleagues in Google Slides through a new ‘Follow’ feature
We’re introducing a new ‘Follow’ feature that allows you to collaborate with colleagues in real-time on Google Slides. Simply, click on a collaborator’s avatar in the Slides toolbar to jump to whatever slide they are on, and continue to move with them as they navigate and make changes to a presentation. | Learn more.
Completed feature rollouts
The features below completed their rollouts to Rapid Release domains, Scheduled Release domains, or both in the past week. Please refer to the original blog post for additional details.
Admins: There is no admin control for this feature.
End users: This feature will be ON by default. To follow a collaborator, click their avatar in the Slides toolbar. If you hover over a followed avatar, a “Following” badge will appear. To stop following a collaborator, click on their avatar again.
You will also stop following the collaborator if:
The collaborator refreshes or leaves the presentation.
Additionally, we’ve modified the workflow for creating and managing all data validation rules, including dropdown chips and checkboxes. You can now view and edit all existing rules that have been created in a specific Sheets tab and create additional rules from a new sidebar view. This update improves the consistency of your overall Sheets experience as this now mirrors the workflows for creating conditional formatting, protected ranges, and named ranges rules.
Getting started
Admins: There is no admin control for this feature.
End users: This feature will be ON by default. You can insert a dropdown chip by selecting Insert > Dropdown or by typing “@” followed by “dropdown”.
Visit the Help Center to learn more about inserting smart chips in your Google Sheets.
Rollout pace
Rapid Release domains: Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility) starting on December 8, 2022
Scheduled Release domains: Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility) starting on December 22, 2022
Availability
Available to all Google Workspace customers, as well as legacy G Suite Basic and Business customers
In the Google Cloud Community, connect with Googlers and other Google Workspace admins like yourself. Participate in product discussions, check out the Community Articles, and learn tips and tricks that will make your work and life easier. Be the first to know what's happening with Google Workspace.
On the “What’s new in Google Workspace?” Help Center page, learn about new products and features launching in Google Workspace, including smaller changes that haven’t been announced on the Google Workspace Updates blog.