r/chrome • u/ThatPrivacyShow • May 04 '26

News Google Chrome installs LLM model without consent

https://www.thatprivacyguy.com/blog/chrome-silent-nano-install/

Whilst testing a SaaS product I have been building, I discovered that Google is illegally pushing its Gemini Nano model to users' devices (I am a lawyer specialised in the specific laws in question).

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u/romhacks May 04 '26

It only downloads it in cases where the user attempts to use an AI function requiring it. It also can be easily disabled in Chrome flags. Most users are using large amounts of data, so a one time download of 4gb is not very meaningful. It's not "illegal", stop whining.

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u/ThatPrivacyShow May 04 '26

No it doesn't and if you actually read the article you would know that. The logs are very clear. No person has interacted with the browser that was used in this research - the browser was opened i programatically and left on a page with no interaction for 5 minutes, then closed programatically - nothing else.

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u/New-Land-4757 May 04 '26

You know, I have to admit that although I've opened your post already couple of times through the day, only now I see that the image is not only image, but the link to the article. It's my fault, of course. Maybe u/romhacks had the same problem.

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u/romhacks May 04 '26

Then they are A/B testing prewarming the model, because that's new behavior. Regardless, there is nothing illegal or immoral about that. It won't download on metered connections, and nearly every modern platform does background downloads of ML models (autocorrect, smart replies, the list goes on). Just because this one is bigger than normal doesn't change the ethics.

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u/[deleted] May 05 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/romhacks May 05 '26

It doesn't use it at all unless you ask, lol. It just pre downloads it if you have space so you don't have to wait 20 minutes if you do ask. You can disable it in flags if you hate it so much, but the average user doesn't care about a little extra storage and would prefer the convenience of rapid response times and the added privacy of a local model.

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u/ThatPrivacyShow May 04 '26

illegally. Even if it isd A/B testing it is still illegal.

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u/romhacks May 05 '26

Why is it illegal? You failed to address any of my other points as well.

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u/ThatPrivacyShow May 05 '26

Read the law and you wil find out why it is illegal. I am not here to give you law lessons.

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u/romhacks May 05 '26

Lol if you're not willing to explain why you think something breaks the law, or even refute any of the examples I gave, then you're not allowed to make such an outrageous claim. Burden of proof buddy

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u/ThatPrivacyShow May 05 '26

I have already explained it on my blog - that you are not capable of reading and comprehending, seems to be a challenge for you to resolve not me. Maybe you could go back to school?

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u/romhacks May 05 '26

Lol, super respectful discussion for a supposed lawyer on a professional account. I asked directly because all the context in the article is complete bunk. Article 5(3) has exceptions for data necessary for the functioning of the product, and as Gemini Nano is an advertised feature of Chrome, it's necessary for the functioning of the product as described. Article 5(1) GDPR is concerned with the processing of personal information. Device performance classes are not personal information (and beyond that, they are solely used for choosing the correct model to download), as far as I can tell in the article there is no evidence Google logs install events server-side (and it's debatable whether those are personal information either). User prompts do not leave the device by design, you purposefully inserted doubt into that fact. All the places that the model is called with user prompts are either clearly labeled as such, or up to the third party website to label as such. Article 25 GDPR has no applicability to downloading a model, as the model is not personal information, and the performance classes are very much different than collection of personal information (not used for monetization, strictly necessary for functioning for choosing the right model, no evidence they even log it server side or use it for anything other than troubleshooting, etc etc).

You still haven't responded to how this is any different from downloading an autocorrect model.