Google has a new plan to wipe out spam calls

Google is on a mission to eliminate spam calls.

The Californian technology giant has announced an update to the default phone app for its Android operating system that will automatically flag up a warning by suspected spam calls.

The app will check the incoming caller's number against an internal database - and then label it a "Suspected spam caller" in a red warning box if it thinks something is amiss.

It's based on the same caller ID tech already available in the app. Previously, it would highlight "useful information about callers or businesses not in your contacts" - but that's now being expanded to include more troublesome callers.

It will also let you label recent callers as spam and block them. But if it was a case of mistaken identity, and the "spam" call was actually from a valid caller, you can report that it was wrongly labelled as spam.

Here's how a spam call looks. The standard blue banner in the app is replaced by a much more ominous red one.