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Google To Auto-Migrate Some Users To 64-bit Chrome 96

Posted by msmash from the hmm dept.
Google says it will automatically upgrade the version of Chrome that some Windows users are running, in what it describes as a bet to improve stability, performance, and security. From a report on ZDNet: In a blog post on Tuesday, the search engine giant explained that Chrome users running 64-bit Windows with 4GB or more of memory will be automatically migrated to the 64-bit version of Chrome if they are running the 32-bit version.
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Google To Auto-Migrate Some Users To 64-bit Chrome More

Google To Auto-Migrate Some Users To 64-bit Chrome

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  • Also... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Mitreya ( 579078 ) <mitreya@gmai l . c om> on Wednesday May 03, 2017 @09:52AM (#54348571)

    Google says it will automatically upgrade the version of Chrome that some Windows users are running, in what it describes as a bet to improve stability, performance, and security.

    In other news, Google will automatically search for results that it considers relevant, regardless of what you type in the search bar, in what it describes as a bet to improve quality of searches.
    (I know on average they are right and users can't spell, but I find it really annoying when my perfectly correct search term is changed to something more common automatically)

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      searching for error messages and function names is almost comical these days due to this. If I put in an error message or a function name, I'd expect pages with those in them would appear. Apparently this is not what search engines do these days.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      That is why since long ago I inconsciently start all google queries with "allintext:" to try to cut the google 'relevant' crap.

      But then google keeps redirecting me to captchas for 'suspicious activity' and verify that I'm not a bot.

      So now I find myself using other search engines substantially more.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      In other news, Google will automatically search for results that it considers relevant, regardless of what you type in the search bar, in what it describes as a bet to improve quality of searches.

      And for adding insult to injury: pretend that offers an "advanced search" - i really miss Altavista...

      (I know on average they are right and users can't spell, but I find it really annoying when my perfectly correct search term is changed to something more common automatically)

      Yes, i know that too, on average they are right, and the average user is... average! But i am not "average" (or below...), so, at least, i want a real "advanced search" - BRING BACK ALTAVISTA!

      Since i am a Greek (b.t.w. sorry for my English), for a few years i was able to use Google in the "advanced" mode because their "average" mode was not yet implemented for the Greek language - until they learned Greek

    • Re: (Score:1, Informative)

      by eltwo ( 4283339 )
      Try using quotation marks, it will suggest a correction, but you will get results for your search term.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • As if it doesn't use enough memory (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    > ...Chrome users running 64-bit Windows with 4GB or more of memory....

    As if it doesn't use enough memory.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Not loading 32 bit shared objects to support Chrome could result in less memory use.
  • Google is a good company (for example leader in fish transportation systems). So I think the move to 64 bit is good.

  • CItrix fix after autoupdate (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    This auto update may break your Chrome in Citrix Xenapp 6.5, I was running the 32 bit version in the Citrix farm for a reason and it auto updated on me and I had to add the following switches to the Chrome shortcuts to resolve the issue --no-sandbox --disable-infobars --disable-gpu --no-default-browser-check --disable-popup-blocking --enable-npapi

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by ledow ( 319597 )

      I thought enable NPAPI doesn't do anything any more? NPAPI plugins have been dead since last year at least, and the forcible override options were deprecated.

      Popup blocking? Okay, I can see that might be annoying.

      Default browser check, I can see that interfering with thing.

      Disable GPU, sure for non-GPU machines.

      But no sandbox just sounds dangerous,

      And I can't see how half the stuff on there would work by default in 32 but not 64-bit versions.

  • Security? (Score:3)

    by hackel ( 10452 ) on Wednesday May 03, 2017 @11:22AM (#54349207) Journal

    What does 32 vs 64 bit have to do with security? I'm genuinely curious... It seems as if they are claiming their 32-bit users, or those without 4GB of RAM are somehow inherently less secure. That seems like marketing nonsense to me.

    Of course this wouldn't even be an issue if Windows wasn't such a giant piece of garbage that it's taken this long to get a mainstream 64-bit operating system and applications. I've been running a 64-bit build of Firefox on Linux since, what, 2004?

    • Re:Security? (Score:4, Informative)

      by gman003 ( 1693318 ) on Wednesday May 03, 2017 @11:44AM (#54349329)

      Address space layout randomization. To make it harder for buffer-related exploits to actually start executing arbitrary code, the memory pages get shuffled around at startup so all the memory addresses are different each time. This still works with a 32-bit address space but there's less total space to use, so with some brute force (eg. really long NOP slides) you can overcome ASLR. With a 64-bit address space, odds are a random jump won't even hit a valid memory address.

      • With a 64-bit address space, odds are a random jump won't even hit a valid memory address.

        People often don't get just how big 2^64 is. It's on the order of the number of grains of sand in all the beaches and all the deserts on Earth [npr.org]. More importantly it's vastly larger than the addressable RAM in your computer... and a 32-bit address space is actually smaller than the amount of RAM in many (most?) computers today, since 32 bits can only address 4 GiB.

        If you have 16 GiB of RAM, and if all of it is mapped into a single process space, that's 2^34 bytes of RAM. So, picking an address at random giv

    • Security? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by DrYak ( 748999 ) on Wednesday May 03, 2017 @11:58AM (#54349433) Homepage

      What does 32 vs 64 bit have to do with security? I'm genuinely curious...

      What is has to do is that the architecture that brought 64bits (AMD64), also brought several security features (like NX bit) among others.

      32bits software might be targeting architecture that predate the NX bit (e.g.: if you still have an old 32bits .EXE that dates back from the Pentium 4 era, it might be writing to and executing from the same memory area), and perhaps Windows could theoretically not enable NX for 32bits legacy software on these grounds? (to avoid to break old 32bits software ?)
      By accelerating the deprecation of 32bits software, they might try to deprecate the non-NX software ?
      (That is pure speculation on my part. I have not enough experience with Windows)

      (register vs. stack pressure is also different between the 2 architecture. AMD64, in addition to 64bits, also brought twice the number of registers. meaning that more things can be kept on CPU and less needs to be written to the stack. Which could mean less potential candidate in case of stack smashing exploit. But I'm really going on a limb here. Return address is way more interesting to abuse in this case than register value.
      It's definitely less probable reason than NX).

      I doubt that software would be affected easily by any other difference between the two
      (e.g.: warp around at different values, 0x7fffffff vs. 0x7fffffffffffffff
      That is highly unlikely : win64 is a LLP64 platform - all integers are still 32bits (both int and long), unless explicitely required (long long, hence the LL) and thus all value still wrap similarily between same source code software compiled for 32bits and 64bits.
      only pointers are promoted to 64bits (hence the P) and thus only point math would wrap differently)

  • How anyone can think a company manipulating software on your machine, without your permission, is acceptable is beyond me. It's bad enough Microsoft does it with their forced updates, but now Google is intruding as well?

    The only reason I have Chrome on my system at work is so I can tell Adobe, "No, I still can't log into our VIP account because your site doesn't work correctly. It doesn't matter if I use IE, Firefox or Chrome, the problem is on your end."

    In days past people would be railing against any com

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by poptix ( 78287 )

      It only happens on Chrome installs which are configured to auto-update. If you don't like it, turn off auto-update.

      • All google chrome installations are default to auto-update. Also to change it to not auto-update, you need to change regedit settings, entering commands and/or manually deleting stuff, which sounds very familiar to hmm Windows 10.

        It is clearly not user friendly and focused upon users.

        For any sane business aiming for stability, it's definitely not the best pick.

    • I'm sure if your car dealer would randomly change things on your car you wouldn't have a problem with it either, right?

      If they were upgrading a component of my car, I would not have a problem with it, which is what Google is doing here. Aside from the additional memory address space, this change also brings:

      - Additional address space layout randomization means brute force attacks won't overcome your ASLR
      - Additional architectural security features such as NX as well as others
      - Twice the number of CPU registers means less writing to the memory stack
      - Additional features I haven't thought of results in this action upgr

      • If they were upgrading a component of my car, I would not have a problem with it

        Define "upgrade". Companies are constantly telling us that the latest is the greatest, but we all know they're looking for every excuse possible to remove features and slip in extra telemetry and crap we don't want. Even minor changes that are supposed to be improvements can break shit in unknown ways. Maybe I need the older version for testing and/or legacy support reasons? Has it ever occurred to you that not everyone is a dumb, ordinary user who just surfs YouTube and plays games all day? Maybe some

      • From the user perspective, everything remains exactly the same.

        That's what you think and what the user thinks, until something breaks.

        New features always meant new bugs to be fixed.

        We have seen updates on different software including google chrome browsers breaking something.

        For casual common users, it probably wouldn't matter because they don't think it matters. But for business it is either wait and lose business time until google fix it or avoid the time lost by not getting the update or using an alternative.

        Also a change from 32-bit to 64 bit meant that a memory

    • I'm sure if your car dealer would randomly change things on your car you wouldn't have a problem with it either, right?

      Your car dealer does this, or is supposed to, every time you bring your car in for service. Goes by many names, but the common one around here is 'recalls.' I think my manufacturer calls them 'warranty campaigns.'

      Most of them I only find out about because the work order lists that they were done; they're generally not urgent enough to specifically call to your attention, but get done whi

    • they shrug and accept the illegal intrusion

      Is it illegal if somewhere, buried in the EULA, there is a clause that you "agreed to" when you first installed Chrome?

      If anything should be illegal, it's click-through licence agreements that no normal person should be expected to comprehend. I recall seeing some agreement regarding Apple's iOS that was more than sixty pages when displayed on my iPhone. Well, yes, I would like to keep my software up-to-date, but seriously?

    • How anyone can think a company manipulating software on your machine, without your permission is acceptable is beyond me.

      From the article:

      The auto-migration will only apply to users who have auto-update enabled.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mspohr ( 589790 )

      OMG! Righteous outrage!
      This update is only for people who have given Chrome auto update permission.
      If you give them permission to update your software, you might expect that they will update your software.
      If you don't want it, don't give them permission.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Chrome has had automatic updates since day one. These days it doesn't even prompt you, it just updates. People seem to like that on phones and in web apps.

      This is no different to any other update.

      I know us geeks hate it, but most people benefit from automatic updates and even for us we can only keep that old version of Firefox going for so long. The internet and the need for network security has made keeping old software going much harder.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Reziac ( 43301 ) *

      Trust me, Google also does forced, silent updates on 32bit machines, up to the limit of OS compatibility. And then whines when it hits an OS version wall.

      Fucking Google is all one word.

  • 32 more bits, no magic. (Score:3)

    by WaffleMonster ( 969671 ) on Wednesday May 03, 2017 @12:10PM (#54349531)

    Google earth is only Google application I ever wanted a 64-bit version for because I'm tired of seeing it hit 2GB process limit and promptly crash. Apparently checking memory is too hard.

    Unless an app actually legitimately requires more than the 32-bit process limit I prefer 32-bit apps for the following reasons:

    1. Slightly less memory overhead /w 32-bit address space.

    2. No matter what a user process won't go haywire and run your system out of memory leaving your entire system in virtual memory swap hell.

    On windows 64-bit for 64-bit's sake in the absence of a legitimate need to address more memory (A web browser does not constitute a legitimate need) simply because 64 is a higher number than 32 is a fruitless enterprise. All of the technobabble differences are a wash with no tangible benefit to the end user.

    • There are a number of benefits to 64-bit support on Intel-compatible hardware besides the extra available memory:

      1. More effective ASLR = better security

      2. More and larger registers = better performance, although this does depend on what the compiler can do with your code

      3. Guaranteed NX support = better security and/or less platform segmentation (depending on whether or not you used it in 32-bit code)

      4. Guaranteed RIP and SSE/SSE2 support = greater performance and/or fewer code branches due to modern featu

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by slew ( 2918 )

        There are a number of benefits to 64-bit support on Intel-compatible hardware besides the extra available memory:

        1. More effective ASLR = better security

        2. More and larger registers = better performance, although this does depend on what the compiler can do with your code

        3. Guaranteed NX support = better security and/or less platform segmentation (depending on whether or not you used it in 32-bit code)

        4. Guaranteed RIP and SSE/SSE2 support = greater performance and/or fewer code branches due to modern features always being present (aka, finally dump some of that legacy crap)

        Hmm, we are talking about upgrading a 32-bit app already running on a 64-bit OS (which has all the goodness you mention). The only issue would be helped by ASLR would be something exploiting a JIT bug or a bug in a 32-bit browser plug-in.

        The real reason they want to move to 64-bit is that it is easier to do effective heap-partitioning in a 64-bit address space. This technique is used to mitigate heap-grooming/buffer-extension and use-after-free exploits (the most common browser initiated exploits). In a

  • I read the headline this morning. On a lark, I went to look at my about page to see what I was running. Well, that prompted an update check. Sure enough, I now have 64 bit Chrome on that machine. It could be a coincidence....

  • That explains a lot. Yesterday, all the extensions in Chrome disappeared. I re-added them, and it was fine. It would have been nice to have some sort of warning, or even a message saying what was done.

    The article says they're doing it with the update to 58.0.3029.96 , and I just verified that's what mine is.

    Next time, just ask, m'kay?

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