Google appears to be working on giving billions of Gmail users a new way of fighting against spam. It seems the company is preparing a new way of creating temporary email addresses within a Gmail account, possibly called 'Shielded Email'. And with Google in the process of deleting millions of inactive accounts, there are sure to be plenty of email aliases available.

Everyone with an email account is aware of how irritating it can be to have an inbox filled with spam. Not to mention the dangers of what may be lurking in those emails, such as a recent realistic AI scam that was said to be capable of tricking "even the most experienced of users." So, the thought of Google providing a means of subverting many of these emails is more than welcome.

The news of Google's potential plan was uncovered after someone dug around in the new 24.45.33 release of Google Play Services APK. Within the new release was found references to 'Shielded Email,' along with a few other hints at how the feature might work.

Those hints pointed to Shielded Email consisting of a system that will allow users to create single-use or limited-use email aliases that will forward messages to the user's primary account. This is similar to a feature already available on Apple devices, but kept behind a paid iCloud+ subscription. Apple's version allows users to "keep your personal email address private by creating unique, random addresses that forward to your personal inbox," with a feature called Hide My Email.

In an update to its original post, Android Authority was able to spot the Shielded Email feature in the Autofill settings menu. However, when the option was tapped, it redirected the user to an empty page on myaccount.google.com.

Google has yet to confirm the new Shielded Email feature. It also remains to be seen if Google will follow Apple by placing it behind a paid subscription of some kind.