Hacker News Reader

Comment by ameliaquining | Hacker News Reader

I feel like it's slightly dishonest not to mention that (according to the Chrome devs) this problem is caused by poorly-behaved modifications to the Chrome installer made by third-party redistributors, and not by Chrome itself.

(Disclosure: I work for Google, but not on Chrome.)

View on HN

It's true that based on the bug report linked in the post, the application bundle is modified by a 3rd party installer running as root. I still think Chrome should correctly handle the permissions problem with a warning or asking for root privileges to fix it, but I've updated the post to point out Chrome itself is not the origin of the problem.

I meant 3rd party plugin installer, like DivX.

> I feel like it's slightly dishonest not to mention that (according to the Chrome devs) this problem is caused by poorly-behaved modifications to the Chrome installer made by third-party redistributors, and not by Chrome itself.

What do you mean ? if I download Chrome from the official website I get a third party installer ? because I have the exact same problem with that very official installer.

He means that bug report is about a third party installer screwing up the permissions and nothing changing it?

Can you point me to an official installer with the same problem?

I'm not aware of those installers installing anything as root.

Oddly the author leaves out any mention of possibilities along these lines.

It looks like the linked article has been updated at the end to clarify.

It sounds like some third party extension's installer (e.g. DivX) is reaching into Chrome.app and mucking with permissions (setting owner to root). Not sure why they don't install into "/Library/Internet Plug-Ins" (maybe it doesn't work with chrome anymore?)

(Edit: but a comment in the linked bug report suggests that this may also occur if Chrome is installed as one user and used by another.)

The bug report claims that in the different-user case you do get a privilege escalation prompt.

I've seen the official Opera installer for Windows exhibit this same behavior.

dishonesty averted! He added a disclosure. :-)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com