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What’s changing We’re updating the interface you use to share files from Google Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Forms on the web. This will replace the previous interface used to share files and manage members of shared drives. These changes will make it easier to share files only with specific people without expanding access beyond what’s needed.

Who’s impacted End users

Why it matters 

Sharing files is critical to collaboration. This is especially true now, as more workforces are remote and collaborating on files from different locations. By making it easier to share files with specific people, we hope to improve collaboration while reducing the risk of access by unwanted users. 

Additional details We’ve made several changes to the sharing experience. These make it easier to perform common tasks, avoid accidental permission changes, and quickly see who has access to a file. Specifically you may notice:

  • Separated, task-focused interface: The new sharing dialog highlights essential user tasks like sharing a file, changing permissions, and viewing file access. The redesign also visually separates sharing with people and groups from link-sharing. 
  • Quick “copy link” button: We’ve added a “copy link” button to make it easier to get the link without changing link permissions. 
  • Easily see current access: The new interface more clearly shows who currently has access to the item, making it easier to quickly audit and change permissions. 


The new sharing interface for Google Drive and Docs editors files 


The old sharing interface for Google Drive and Docs editors files 

Getting started 
  • Admins: This change will take place by default. There is no admin control for this feature. 
  • End users: This feature will be ON by default. Use our Help Center to learn more about how to share Google Drive files. 

Rollout pace 

Availability 
  • Available to all G Suite and Drive Enterprise customers, as well as users with personal Google Accounts 

Resources 

Roadmap 
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What’s changingWe’ve added a setting in the Admin console to allow you to enable power-saving signaling over HDMI from Google Meet hardware. When enabled, this feature can help you save power by turning off Meet hardware displays when they’re not in use.


Who’s impactedAdmins only

Why you’d use itSome displays, like those in conference rooms and lobbies, are often left on indefinitely, wasting power and shortening their useful lifespan. This setting allows compatible displays to be turned off automatically after 10 minutes of inactivity.

Displays are automatically turned on 10 minutes before a scheduled meeting or if a user interacts with the touch panel controller.

Additional detailsYou might need to turn on HDMI-CEC, change other advanced settings, or update the firmware on your display. Consult your displays manual for more information.
Getting started
  • Admins: This feature will be OFF by default and can be enabled at the organizational unit (OU) level. Visit the Help Center to learn more about turning display power saving on or off for your organization.
  • End users: There is no end user setting for this feature. 


Rollout pace
  • This feature is available now for all users.


Availability
  • Available to all G Suite customers

Resources
Roadmap

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Quick launch summary You can now manage and secure Windows 10 devices through the Admin console, just as you do for Android, iOS, Chrome, and Jamboard devices. This also means you can enable SSO so users can more easily access G Suite and other SSO-enabled applications on Windows 10 devices. This was previously available in beta.

Now, all G Suite admins can now use Google Credential Provider for Windows to:

  • Enable their organization to use existing G Suite account credentials to login to Windows 10 devices, and easily access apps and services with SSO. 
  • Protect user accounts with Google’s anti-hijacking and suspicious login detection technologies. 

Additionally, G Suite Enterprise, G Suite Enterprise for Education, and Cloud Identity Premium customers can now also:

  • Ensure that all Windows 10 devices used to access G Suite are updated, secure, and within compliance of organizational policies. 
  • Perform admin actions, such as wiping a device and pushing device configuration updates, to Windows 10 devices from the cloud without connecting to corp network. 

This can help simplify device management, help to increase data security, and reduce the hurdles and logins users need to access applications and get work done. See our previous announcement for more details on the Windows 10 management features and benefits.

See our Help Center to learn more about enhanced desktop security for Windows. See our post on the Cloud Blog to learn how this and other launches can help G Suite customers stay secure.


Getting started 

Admin controls available for Windows 10 devices 

Rollout pace 

Availability Login and SSO features associated with Google Credential Provider for Windows:

  • Available to all G Suite and Cloud Identity customers 


Device management for Windows 10 devices:

  • Available to G Suite Enterprise, G Suite Enterprise for Education, and Cloud Identity Premium customers 
  • Not available to G Suite Basic, G Suite Business, G Suite for Education, G Suite for Nonprofits, and Cloud Identity Free customers 

Resources 
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What’s changing We’re enhancing Context-Aware Access (CAA) with a beta that enables admins to use it to control SAML apps. This gives admins the ability to control access to SAML apps based on the user, the device, and the context they are in when they are trying to access an app.

CAA for SAML apps will work for customers that use Google as the primary identity provider (IdP) to enable access to third party apps from pre-integrated SAML apps or custom SAML apps. It’s available to G Suite Enterprise, G Suite Enterprise for Education, Cloud Identity Premium, and Drive Enterprise customers only. See our post on the Cloud Blog to learn how this and other launches can help G Suite customers stay secure.

Who’s impacted Admins only

Why you’d use it Using Context-Aware Access, you can create granular access control policies to apps based on attributes including the user, location, device security status, and IP address. This can improve your security posture by reducing the chances that there’s unintended access to specific apps and the data in them. Some ways you could use CAA for SAML include:

  • Only allow access to your CRM app when the user is on the corporate network. 
  • Only allow access to a cloud storage app if the user has an up to date operating system and an encrypted device. 
  • Only permit IT admins to access certain tools from a remote location. 
  • Only permit users in a specific country to access certain apps. 


Additional details 
Builds on the CAA for G Suite infrastructure 
Controlling CAA for SAML apps will use the same infrastructure and admin console interface as CAA for G Suite. That means you can use any pre-configured access levels, user groups, and end-user messaging for CAA to SAML. Use our Help Center to find out more about managing context aware access in G Suite.

CAA for SAML only enforced at time of sign-in 
CAA for SAML apps is only enforced at the time of sign-in. This is different from CAA for G Suite applications, which offers a higher level of control. G Suite applications are built by Google and CAA controls are enabled for continuous evaluation of context (IP, device attribute, etc) during use. As SAML apps are non-Google applications using Google sign-in, we’re only able to evaluate context at the point where a user signs into these applications using Google sign-in. After that sign-in, the context is not evaluated again until the session is terminated and users try to sign-in again with Google.

Getting started 
  • Admins: This is an open beta, so the controls will automatically become available to you if you are a G Suite Enterprise, G Suite Enterprise for Education, Cloud Identity Premium, or Drive Enterprise customer. 
  • End users: No end-user impact until turned on by the admin. 

Availability 
  • Available to G Suite Enterprise, G Suite Enterprise for Education, Cloud Identity Premium, and Drive Enterprise customers. 
  • Not available to G Suite Basic, G Suite Business, G Suite for Education, G Suite for Nonprofits, and Cloud Identity Free customers. 

Resources 
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What’s changing We’re adding new security controls that admins can use to protect sensitive company data on iOS devices. Admins can now choose to:

  • Restrict copy and paste on data belonging to G Suite accounts to other accounts. This can prevent corporate data from being exfiltrated to personal accounts. 
  • Restrict the ability for users to drag and drop files from specific apps within their G Suite account. 

At launch, admin controls will apply to five G Suite iOS apps: Gmail, Drive, Docs, Sheets, and Slides. This feature is available to G Suite Enterprise, G Suite Enterprise for Education, and Cloud Identity Premium customers. Users will still be able to copy and paste and drag and drop from personal accounts to G Suite accounts. Protections are available to devices managed with G Suite’s basic or advanced mobile device management, as well as devices with basic mobile management alongside a separate enterprise mobility management (EMM) solution.

Who’s impacted Admins

Why it’s important Without these features, there are limitations in the controls admins have to prevent users moving corporate data between corporate and personal accounts on the same iOS device. While admins can prevent sharing files between managed and unmanaged apps, users can still share data between accounts when apps support multiple accounts or via cut/copy/paste actions. For example, iOS users can copy the text of a corporate email into a personal account. This introduces the potential for data leaks and reduces the overall security of your corporate data on iOS.

The admin controls introduced in this launch will help increase protections and make it more difficult for corporate data to be accidentally or intentionally shared to a personal account. Similar protections are already available on Android devices through Work Profiles.

See our post on the Cloud Blog to learn how this and other launches can help G Suite customers stay secure.

Getting started 
  • Admins: This feature will be OFF by default and can be enabled at the organizational unit (OU) level. Visit the Help Center to learn more about data protection on iOS devices. 
  • End users: There is no end-user setting for this feature. If a user tries to perform a restricted copy and paste action, the text “This info can only be shared within your organization’s G Suite apps” will paste instead of the text they copied. 


Admin controls for data exfiltration protection on iOS 
Rollout pace 
  • This feature is already available for all domains. 

Availability 
  • Available to G Suite Enterprise, G Suite Enterprise for Education customers and Cloud Identity Premium customers 
  • Not available to G Suite Basic, G Suite Business, G Suite for Education, G Suite for Nonprofits customers, and Cloud Identity Free customers 

Resources 
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Quick launch summaryGoogle Meet will now automatically enhance your video to adapt to low light conditions. Now, you can take a video call from anywhere, even with suboptimal lighting, on your Android or iOS device without fear that others on the call won’t be able to see you.

Video enhancements will begin five seconds after entering an area with low light. As your lighting conditions change, Meet will intelligently adapt, for example increasing enhancements as lighting conditions worsen and turning processing off when lighting conditions improve.

As mobile devices have different camera hardware and processing capabilities, the actual end result may differ between devices.
Getting startedAdmins: There is no admin control for this feature.

End users: This feature will be ON by default and works automatically. To turn low light mode off, you can do so in the in-call settings menu.

Rollout paceiOS


Android


Availability
  • Available to all G Suite customers

Resources


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What’s changing We’re adding three features in new Google Sites (sites.google.com/new):

  • Site templates - Quickly and easily create high-quality sites optimized for common uses. 
  • Announcement banners - Highlight important information to make sure site visitors see time-sensitive updates. 
  • Access for Family Link accounts - Enable users with Google Accounts managed by Family Link to view and edit sites. 

See more details below, or see our Cloud Blog to post to see how Sites can support remote work and learning.

Who’s impacted 
  • Templates and announcement banners: All site owners and editors. 
  • Access for Family Link accounts: Site editors and viewers with Family Link accounts. 

Why it matters We hope these new features make it easier to create and use sites, especially as our customers deal with the impact of COVID-19. For example, announcement banners can help businesses quickly communicate important information to customers. Using templates to create high-quality sites without requiring design or coding skills can help educational institutions and businesses enable remote learning and workings. Overall, we hope the enhancements make Sites a more useful tool to share information across dispersed audiences.

See our Cloud Blog to post to learn more about how Sites can support remote work and learning. 

Additional details 
Site templates 
For this launch, we’ve built 10 templates for common site uses, available in 16 languages. With one click, you can start a site suited for a specific purpose with a professional look and feel. Then, you can customize the site to make it your own. Examples of sites that templates will make it easier to create include:

  • Help centers: Help users learn how to use new tools and resources, for example tools to enable a remote workforce or remote learning for students. 
  • Project sites: Help colleagues or classmates collaborate on a project remotely. 
  • Class or team sites: Have a centralized place for team resources and information. 
  • Club sites: Enable students to continue club activities while remote learning. 
  • Small business sites: Keep customers informed about your business, like your restaurant or design services, while they’re social distancing. 

We’re building more templates and working to make templates available in more languages. You’ll see more templates for common business sites added to the available options in the next several weeks. Use our Help Center to find more information about using templates in Google Sites.

Announcement banners 
Created based on customer feedback, announcement banners help site owners communicate timely, important messages to visitors. They display information in a banner at the top of the site, grabbing viewers’ attention when they land on the page. Ways that customers can use banners include:

  • A business administrator at a large company can add a banner to an employee resource site to highlight newly added pages and information in the larger site. 
  • A small business owner can add a banner to alert customers of changing operating hours or business practices. 
  • A teacher can add a banner to a class site to notify students that a new assignment has been posted. 

Use the Help Center to learn more about how to add an announcement banner to a site.



Access for accounts managed with Family Link 

Until now, users with personal Google Accounts managed with Family Link have not been able to view or edit sites. To help increase access to valuable resources, we’ve made it possible for Google Accounts managed with Family Link to view public sites, and view and edit sites that are shared with them.

While personal Google accounts managed by Family Link can now access Sites, students with G Suite for Education accounts should continue to use their school accounts to log in and complete schoolwork in Sites and other G Suite services.

Important note:  This only applies to sites created with new Sites. Personal accounts managed by Family Link will still not be able to view or edit sites managed with classic Sites. Use our Help Center to learn more about using Google Sites with Accounts managed with Family Link.

Getting started  Admins: These features will be ON by default. There are no admin controls for them.

End users:  These features will be ON by default. Visit the Help Center to learn more about how to create a website from a template or add an announcement banner to a site. Note that parents can use Family Link to restrict websites or permissions if their child is using Chrome on an Android device or a Chromebook, and may have to allow their child to see your site.

Rollout pace Site templates: 


Announcement banners: 


Access for Family Link accounts:

  • Already available to all users. 

Availability 
  • Available to all G Suite customers 

Resources 

Roadmap 
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Update, April 24, 2020: We've updated this post to correct the rollout schedule. The feature is fully rolled out to Rapid Release domains, but Scheduled Release domains will get the feature between April 29 and May 1, 2020. The post previously said it was already fully rolled out to all domains. 

What’s changing You can now share higher-quality video with audio content in a Meet video call. You can do this through a new present a Chrome tab feature. Now, when you use this feature with video content playing, everyone in the meeting will see and hear the video and audio being shared. This means you can confidently use videos, gifs, animations, and other media in your meetings.

Who’s impacted End users

Why it matters Videos can be a critical part of meetings and presentations. As more meetings are taking place online, it’s important that presenters can share smooth videos with audio to all attendees, wherever they are. Situations where you may benefit from high-quality video and audio in presentations include:

  • A business meeting to review promotional videos. 
  • An engineering meeting to share pre-recorded product or feature demonstrations. 
  • Teachers sharing videos as part of a lesson plan to students.
  • Presenting slides with embedded videos or GIFs, or with animated transitions between slides. 

Additionally, by adding the ability to present a tab rather than a window or your full screen, we’re providing more control to presenters to make sure they can minimize distractions while they’re presenting.

Additional details 
Present a tab and easily switch between tabs 
With this launch you can now present an individual Chrome tab. When you present a tab, it will be highlighted so you can clearly see which one you’re presenting. If you change your view to a new tab, a pop-up will ask if you want to switch to presenting the new tab or keep presenting the previous tab, making it easy to move between tabs and control what information you share with the meeting. 

Use “present a tab” to share high-quality video and audio 
The high-quality video and audio playback only works when you present an individual tab feature in Chrome (see above) on desktop devices. It does not work if you’re presenting a full window or your whole screen.

Upgrading previous Meet video presentation experience 
Until now, users have been able to play video while presenting in Meet, but may have noticed choppy playback and no audio. Some users chose to use the Cast feature to present audio and video, but that had several limitations as well. This launch will mean users can avoid workarounds and limitations and easily include high-quality video in their meetings.

Users can already present high-quality audio and video to meetings using an HDMI cable with some Meet hardware kits. This will continue to work.

Getting started Admins: This feature will be ON by default. There is no admin control for this feature. You may want to review your organization’s Meet video settings.

End users: Visit the Help Center to learn more about presenting videos during meetings.

Rollout pace 
Availability 
  • Available to all G Suite customers 

Resources 

Roadmap 
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What’s changingYou can now see up to 16 people at the same time in the tile layout option in Google Meet.
See up to 16 other meeting participants in the tiled layout

Who’s impactedEnd users
Why you’d use itSeeing more people at the same time can help improve the dynamics of larger group meetings and classes. Whether it's seeing everyone's reactions to what's being discussed, or more easily tracking multiple speakers, it can help remote meetings feel more like in-person meetings and encourage participation.

We hope that this helps individuals and teams feel more connected while apart.
Additional detailsThe layout will adjust to show active speakers. If you’re in a meeting with more than 16 other people, there’s an option to open the list of participants and see who else is in the meeting. As a reminder, all G Suite customers can host meetings with up to 250 participants through September 30, 2020.

This feature is currently only available in Meet on the web. More updates are coming for larger meetings, better presentation layouts, and support across more devices.
Getting startedAdmins: There is no admin control for this feature.

End users: To use the tiled layout in a meeting, follow the instructions in the Help Center.
Rollout pace

Availability
  • Available to all G Suite customers

Resources
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What’s changingGoogle Meet is now available in Gmail, which means you can start and join meetings right from your inbox, making it even easier to stay connected.
Options to start or join a Google Meet video meeting now in Gmail

Enter a meeting code or nickname to join a Google Meet video meeting

Who’s impacted
Admins and end users

Why you’d use itWith more and more people working and learning from home, we want to make it easier for you to connect and keep things moving forward. With Meet in Gmail, you can easily start or join a meeting in seconds. Our goal is to help you follow the flow of the day, seamlessly switching between email and video meetings—whichever form of communication you need.

Additional detailsWhen you start a meeting, a new window pops up with a secure, unique meet.google.com URL. Choosing to join a meeting lets you enter a meeting code (provided by the organizer) or use a meeting nickname to quickly get everyone into an ad hoc meeting. Simply choose a nickname (ex: “catchup” or “kevin-priya”), share it with anyone inside your domain, and type it into “Join a meeting” to get everyone in your meeting.

Once in the meeting, you can invite more people to join.

This feature is currently only available in Gmail on the web with mobile coming soon.

Getting startedAdmins: This feature will be ON by default for all domains with video calling enabled. You can disable Meet by turning off video calling in the Admin console. Alternatively you can turn it off by turning off the Hangouts Meet and Google Hangouts service, but this will turn off classic Hangouts as well.

End users: There is no end user setting for this feature. Visit the Help Center to learn more about starting or joining a video call from Gmail.
Rollout pace

Availability
  • Available to all G Suite customers

Resources


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What’s changing

Going forward, Google Meet hardware devices, including Series One Board 65 and Desk 27 devices will now adhere to the following service statuses:

This change could impact access to Calendar and Jamboard across your Meet hardware fleet — we strongly recommend reviewing these settings before April 22, 2024 to ensure there are no disruptions.


Getting started
Admins: 

Rollout pace

Availability
  • Available to Google Workspace customers with Google Meet hardware licenses. 

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What’s changingLast month, we made our advanced Google Meet video-conferencing capabilities available at no cost to all G Suite Basic, Business, Education, and Nonprofit customers. We’re extending that availability to September 30, 2020, to ensure businesses, organizations, and educators continue their work during this crisis. See our previous post for more details on these features.

In addition, we’re dropping “Hangouts” from the Google Meet name. You’ll start to see this change reflected in the product and across resources over the next few weeks.
Who’s impactedAdmins and end users
Why it’s importantWe hope this extension makes it easier for our customers to operate during this crisis. We also recognize that as work and learning are increasingly done from a distance, maintaining security and control across your organization is all the more critical. Check out our post on the G Suite blog to learn more about how Google Meet keeps your organization’s information safe.
Getting startedAdmins: If you haven’t yet done so, enable Meet video calling for your organization. You can then turn on live streaming and recording.

  • G Suite Basic, Business, and Nonprofit customers: These advanced features are OFF by default and can be enabled at the domain, OU, or group level.
  • G Suite for Education customers: These advanced features are OFF by default and can be enabled at the domain, OU, or group level. Please see our FAQ in the Help Center for additional education-specific considerations when enabling Meet and these features.
  • G Suite Enterprise and Enterprise for Education customers: These features are already available in your domain and will continue to respect your current settings.

End users: Once enabled in the Admin console, end users can live stream and record meetings. Visit the Help Center to learn more about how to live stream and record a meeting.

Rollout pace
  • Free access to advanced features is available now to all G Suite customers.

Availability
  • Available to all G Suite customers.

Resources


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What’s changingRecently, the Google Security blog outlined how the usage of Transport Layer Security (TLS) has grown to more than 96% of all traffic seen by a Chrome browser on Chrome OS. The blog post also highlighted a significant goal: to enable TLS by default for our Google products and services, and to ensure that TLS works out of the box.

Gmail already supports TLS, so that if the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) mail connection can be secured through TLS, it will be. However, in order to encourage more organizations to increase their email security posture, and to further the above goal of enabling TLS by default, we’ve made the following changes:

  • TLS for mail connections will now be enabled by default
  • Admins are now able to test their SMTP outbound routes’ TLS configuration in the Admin console before deployment. They no longer need to wait for messages to bounce.

While admins have always had the ability to require TLS encryption for mail routes, it was previously off by default. Note that existing mail routes will not be impacted by these changes.

Who’s impactedAdmins
Why it’s importantWe always recommend that admins enable existing mail security features, including SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, to help protect end users. We also recommend that admins turn on MTA Strict Transport Security (MTA-STS), which improves Gmail security by requiring authentication checks and encryption for email sent to their domains. Enabling TLS by default on new SMTP mail routes enhances the security posture of our customers while enabling admins to test connections before enforcing TLS on existing routes makes it easier for them to deploy best practice security policies.

This change will not impact mail routes that were previously created.

Additional details

TLS enabled by default on new mail routes
With TLS enabled by default for new mail routes, all certificate validation requirements are also enabled by default. This ensures that recipient hosts have a certificate issued for the correct host that has been signed by a trusted Certificate Authority (CA). See more details about how we’re changing the requirements for trusted CAs below.

Admins will still have the ability to customize their TLS security settings on newly created mail routes. For example, if mail is forwarded to third-party or on-premise mail servers using internal CA certificates, admins may need to disable CA certificate validation. Disabling CA certificate validation, or even disabling TLS entirely, is not recommended. We encourage admins to test their SMTP TLS configuration in the Admin console in order to validate the TLS connection to external mail servers before disabling any recommended validations. See more details about how to test TLS connections in the Admin console.

Certificate Authority distrust in Gmail
In the past, the Google Security Blog has highlighted instances where Chrome would no longer trust root CA certificates used to intercept traffic on the public internet and where Chrome distrusts specific CAs.

If these scenarios occur in the future, these certificates will also be distrusted by Gmail. When this happens, mail sent using routes that require TLS with CA-signed certificate enforcement may bounce if the CA is no longer trusted. Although the list of root certificates trusted by Gmail can be retrieved from the Google Trust Services repository, we encourage admins to use the Test TLS Connections feature in the Admin console to confirm whether certificates have been distrusted.

Test TLS connections in Admin console
Admins can now use the new Test TLS Connection feature to verify whether a mail route can successfully establish a TLS connection with full validation to any destination, such as an on-premise mail server or a third-party mail relay, before enforcing TLS for that destination.
Getting started

Admins:

TLS settings
TLS will be ON by default for all new mail routes. We recommend that admins review all of their existing routes and enable all recommended TLS security options for these routes as well.

Testing TLS connections
Admins who want to require a secure TLS connection for emails can now verify that the connection to the recipient's mail server is valid simply by clicking on the “Test TLS Connection” button in the Admin console; they no longer need to wait for emails to bounce.

Learn more about requiring mail to be transmitted via a secure (TLS) connection and adding mail routes in the Help Center.

All certificate validations are now enabled by default when creating a new TLS compliance setting.

TLS and all certificate validations are now enabled by default when creating a new mail route.

End users: There are no end user settings for these features.

Rollout pace

Availability
  • Available to all G Suite customers

Resources


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