Google Chrome is downloading a 4 GB Gemini Nano model onto users' machines without consent, with no opt-in, no opt-out short of enterprise tooling, and an automatic re-download every time the user deletes it. The pattern is identical to the Anthropic Claude Desktop case I wrote about last month, but the scale is between two and three orders of magnitude larger. This article does the legal analysis and, for the first time, the environmental analysis. The numbers are not small.
The AI model we’re talking about here is not used for most of the AI features, which instead relies on cloud services. Those 4GB are there only for a fringe feature most people don’t know/don’t care about, hidden behind hoops you’ll have to jump through to get.
The AI model we’re talking about here is not used for most of the AI features, which instead relies on cloud services. Those 4GB are there only for a fringe feature most people don’t know/don’t care about, hidden behind hoops you’ll have to jump through to get.