Despite having over 2 billion users worldwide, Chrome has had a tough year and in July, Google confirmed it had seen more successful browser hacks by mid-2021 than in the whole of 2020. And now a flurry of new warnings have been issued from an unexpected source.
Microsoft is now issuing trust and privacy warnings to anyone downloading Chrome
Microsoft has started sending warning notifications to users who attempt to download Chrome, with the company warning of privacy, security and trust concerns with Google’s browser. And with Microsoft leveraging its billion-strong Windows user base for the attacks, they will turn heads.
First spotted by Neowin, Microsoft is pushing a variety of warnings — some serious, some mildly humorous — in an attempt to stop Windows users from installing Chrome. Most significant are Microsoft’s warnings that its own Edge browser comes “with the added trust of Microsoft” and delivers “more privacy”.
Ultimately, Microsoft’s primary motivation here is marketing — though it has a strong argument with regards to privacy. It also comes at a time when Microsoft has locked down elements of Windows 11 making it harder to switch from Edge, with Windows searches always defaulting Microsoft’s browser and the company forcing users to set browser defaults individually for over 10 types of link and file. In fact, third party tools like Edge Deflector) have become popular to combat this.
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Google doesn’t get off scot-free, with the company trying to push users away from Microsoft’s Bing search engine in favour of Google searches. That said, Microsoft has stepped things up to a level with its new warnings.
Needless to say, Chrome loyalists will not be phased by Microsoft’s alerts but they may well cause concern for less tech-savvy users, and it will be interesting to see how/if Google responds.
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