Chrome is a Malware

Yes, you read it right. “Chrome is a Malware.”

Ever since I have been using Motorola One Power (purchased July 19), I never used Google Chrome. Moreover, I had disabled all the Google apps except YouTube and Play Services. But recently, with the Covid-19 bringing everything on the digital platforms, this couldn’t last anymore.

My University requires me to use Google Meet. All the class updates are forwarded through Google Classroom. Moreover, all the WhatsApp groups have slowly started to migrate to Google Groups. Attendance is taken through Google Sheets and Docs. There’s no way that I can skip the ‘Google’ brand anymore.

So recently, I gave up on my Anti-Google agenda and started moving into it. But my choice of default browsers remained same, its Mozilla Firefox or Brave. Very lately, Brave has given some of the good vibes that Firefox lacked. Though its based on Chromium engine, Brave has built-in AdBlock, a clean Interface and BATs. So, Chrome still remains disabled on my phone.

Recently, I started observing some odd behaviour from Android. Chrome gets installed automatically and I have to disable it again. Here’s the Screenshot of factory version that was installed automatically without my acknowledge.

And here’s the currently available update from Play Store.

I have uninstalled this version and have disabled the app too 3 times and still it gets its way back in my phone.

This kind of behaviour is only observed when a phone is affected by a Malware, in my case its Google Chrome Malware. And when Google itself becomes a malware, you can’t really do anything about it. I have reported this bug and waiting for a resolution.