Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member Latest Breaking News Editorials & Other Articles General Discussion The DU Lounge All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

General Discussion

Showing Original Post only (View all)

A_Woman_from_MI

(193 posts)
Tue May 5, 2026, 02:12 PM 18 hrs ago

FYI: Google Chrome Silently Installs a 4 GB AI Model On Your Device [View all]

Just a heads up for anyone using chrome and unaware of the stealthy download

https://tech.yahoo.com/ai/gemini/articles/google-chrome-silently-installs-4-164550734.html

The scale becomes staggering when you consider Chrome’s massive user base. This silent installation across hundreds of millions of devices represents carbon emissions equivalent to thousands of cars running for an entire year—all for AI features most users will never discover.

Manual removal triggers automatic re-download, revealing this wasn’t an accident.

Delete the weights.bin file manually and Chrome treats your choice like a system error to be corrected. The browser automatically re-downloads the model on next launch, because apparently your 4GB of storage belongs to Google’s AI roadmap now.
4 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
Latest Discussions»General Discussion»FYI: Google Chrome Silent...