Google Chrome Beta 3 is Here, High Fives All Round

Article by George Norman (Cybersecurity Editor)

on 31 Oct 2008

Just two days back Mark Larson was announcing to the world that a third Beta installment of Google Chrome, version 0.3.154.9 if you want to get technical about it, has been released and the software will automatically update in a few days time. Since he used the plural (days), we were expecting a minimum delivery time of two days; we didn’t even want to consider other alternatives, even though we could have theoretically updated manually.

The third Beta installment addresses three change categories: security, bugs and enhancements.

In terms of security, Google Chrome Beta 0.3 solves the pop-up spoofing vulnerability reported in previous software versions. This security problem refers to the fact that if you click on a pop-up you will be directed to a “fake” site and by that I mean the web page address you see in the bar has been manipulated to cover up the true origins of the site. This could be used for phising attacks, or any other form of attack where the main goal is to get the user to disclose private, sensitive information.

A total of five bugs have been fixed. The ones that annoyed me the most were the “Chrome has crashed” bug (that message was displayed every time I closed a PDF tab) and the scrolling bug (doing so on a laptop touchpad was impossible). Other bug related problems that have been addressed: web proxies, plugin performance and reliability, secure sites browsing.

There are also four Chrome enhancements in the recently released Beta. The manner in which potentially harmful files are downloaded has been modified, allowing for safer transfers. The spell checker now lets you add words to the dictionary. Opening a new window will open a normal window; opening an incognito window will open a new window; the options menu associated to these actions has been moved to “Customize and control Google Chrome”.


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