
Google Chrome Is Secretly Scanning Files On Your Computer
It is very likely that you currently reading this article from Google Chrome. In fact, quite more than half of TechCaption readers do it and this is something that is repeated in the rest of the Internet. Therefore, it is possible that in the last hours you have heard siren songs about the espionage of Google Chrome. Everything would be related to the scanning of the files on our computer, but why does the browser do this? Is our privacy at risk?
The Google Chrome antivirus is analyzing the files of our computer without any information or secretly. The truth is that, after the scandal of Facebook and the unauthorized use of user data, the sensitivity of these is in the nick of time and any information about it makes the alarm go off. This is what has happened with Google Chrome when it is detected that it is scanning the files of the users’ computers.
The whole problem is based on a tweet from Kelly Shortridge, who works at the cybersecurity company SecurityScorecard. In this message, it showed that Chrome was scanning files in the document folder on her Windows computer. From then on, the denunciation of the popular browser was unleashed.
I was wondering why my Canarytoken (a file folder) was triggering & discovered the culprit was chrome.exe. Turns out @googlechrome quietly began performing AV scans on Windows devices last fall. Wtf m8? This isn’t a system dir, either, it’s in Documents pic.twitter.com/IQZPSVpkz7
— Kelly Shortridge (@swagitda_) March 29, 2018
Many people began to get nervous with that message to the point that the head of security of Google Chrome had to meet the step. Everything is related to the Chrome Cleanup Tool that tries to prevent us from installing malicious extensions on our computer or that ads appear in the places where they should not.
CCT isn't a system-wide scan or filter. It runs weekly, at background priority and normal user privs, for up to 15 mins. It scans browser hijacking points, which may cause it to follow links elsewhere. The engine is a heavily sandboxed subset of ESET. 2/https://t.co/xYl0tNeHEa
— Justin Schuh (@justinschuh) April 1, 2018
All this was launched in 2016 as explained by Google in its blog at that time. In the policy of using this tool, we see that it explains that Chrome periodically scans the device for unwanted or malicious software. They explain that the tool is usually activated once a week and it does not have special access permissions to the system.
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In addition, it works inside a sandbox for more security and users must expressly accept the draft of harmful software for the computer since the application will not take for them this decision. Basically, it’s like an antivirus in the cloud, but many were unaware of the integration in the Google Chrome browser.
So, what do you think about this? Simply share all your thoughts and opinions in the comment section below.