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"gewg_" writes:

from the did-not-want dept.

El Reg reports [theregister.co.uk]

New Chromium builds will no longer download/install the Hotword Shared Module and will automatically remove the module on startup if it was previously installed.

A closed-source and binary-only kernel module caused a fair fuss [theregister.co.uk] when it was found inveigling its way into the very much open-source Chromium.

Thanking the community for their attention and input on the issue, one of the project developers told [google.com] the issues ticket thread that "as of the newly-landed r335874, Chromium builds, by default, will not download this module at all."

[...]An additional developer update [google.com] regarding Hotword explains that "Builds of Google Chrome will still download this module by default. It will not be activated unless the user explicitly flips a preference to do so."

Related: Google Drops Binary Code into Chromium for Linux [soylentnews.org]

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