this post was submitted on 06 May 2026
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Chrome version 147 silently downloads Gemini Nano's weights.bin file to local storage, sparking major privacy, data, and legal concerns.

top 42 comments
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[–] isVeryLoud@lemmy.ca 3 points 8 hours ago

"weights" is damn right lol

[–] Zier@fedia.io 40 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

People are shocked when the bad boyfriend (google) that people warned them about, do highly unethical things. That boyfriend only exists to use & abuse you, it has no other purpose anymore.

[–] username_1@programming.dev 7 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

That "boyfriend" just makes money, he doesn't know or even care about your existence.

[–] devolution@lemmy.world 5 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

That boyfriend was once sweet, caring, quirky, and innovative once. He tried many things and was better than his older two brothers, the hip one who charged too much and the lame one that your parents were forced to deal with.

Somewhere along the way, he forgot his roots and became Jennifer Lopez.

[–] FippleStone@aussie.zone 4 points 20 hours ago

His name is Jennifer Lopez, he likes burritos, and tacos

[–] Bullerfar@lemmy.world 6 points 16 hours ago

I don't use chrome on my personal computer.

[–] KindnessIsPunk@lemmy.ca 16 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago)

Bloatware, in my Google Chrome!?

[–] outandinburger@ttrpg.network 23 points 1 day ago (1 children)

No it isn’t. Because I don’t run anything from Google.

[–] Ilovethebomb@sh.itjust.works 5 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Let me guess, you run Linux?

[–] Ganbat@lemmy.dbzer0.com 24 points 22 hours ago (1 children)
[–] Rekorse@sh.itjust.works 5 points 18 hours ago

My arch system runs an arch VM.

[–] outandinburger@ttrpg.network 1 points 15 hours ago

No, I just don’t use anything from Google. What do they offer that is good anymore? Zero things.

[–] irate944@piefed.social 2 points 21 hours ago

I use arch btw

[–] umbraroze@piefed.social 14 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Well I'm glad Google decided to bite the bullet and face the immense, Biblical backlash. So that Mozilla Corporation has a few new thoughts to ponder on.

[–] Dojan@pawb.social 2 points 15 hours ago

Their idiot CEO will move forward with forcing AI onto people too. CEOs don’t learn.

[–] LifeLikeLady@lemmy.world 3 points 17 hours ago

Not on my machine lol.

[–] damnthefilibuster@lemmy.world 8 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

What if you keep the file around but write to it and zero size it? Does chrome still download the file again?

[–] Peruvian_Skies@sh.itjust.works 4 points 15 hours ago

Eventually it'll update.

[–] 1Fuji2Taka3Nasubi@piefed.zip 2 points 23 hours ago (2 children)

I wonder if they do it on phones as well. Not everyone has a 256GB+ device, and 4GB would be a significant chunk on even that.

[–] atrielienz@lemmy.world 4 points 17 hours ago

On android phones I believe this is called Gemini Nano which is part of the Gemini app for Android and the android AIcore app. The AI core app supposedly eats up like 4-12GB of storage. I believe it's a system app that you can't uninstall.

Might be worth a look at your phone apps especially if you have a pixel phone.

[–] Skankhunt420@sh.itjust.works 5 points 21 hours ago

What little I read about this it seems to only be on desktop. For now.

Some suit in the C Suite is having a wet dream though imagining the not so far off future where they can run shit like this on your phone.

[–] plz1@sh.itjust.works -4 points 17 hours ago (2 children)

It's roughly twice the size of the base app, if it's the same as Edge, which on my machine is 1.82GB. It's shady as hell, but "massive" is doing a lot of lifting in this headline.

[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 3 points 8 hours ago

Even 1 gig is pretty fucking huge for a web browser. 🤨

[–] theneverfox@pawb.social 12 points 16 hours ago

That is absolutely massive for a browser. Like multiple orders of magnitude too big. Like what are we even doing

And I don't care if everyone is doing it, it's still too big!