Google Criticized For 'Opaque' Audio-Listening Binary In Debian Chromium

An anonymous reader writes: Google has fallen under criticism for including a compiled audio-monitoring binary in Chromium for Debian. A report was logged at Debian's bug register on Tuesday noting the presence of a non-auditable 'hotword' module in Chromium 43. The module facilitates Google's "OK, Google" functionality, which listens for that phrase via a Chrome user's microphone and attempts afterwards to interpret the user's instructions as a search query. Matt Giuca from the Chromium development team responded after the furore developed, disclaiming Google from any responsibility from auditing Chromium code, but promising clearer controls over the feature in release 45.

Comments

Re:Comment bubble thing next to the story icon?

[bulled]

Does the average /.er have anyone to share something with?

Re:"Ok, Google, are you snitching to the NSA?"

[jellomizer]

Oh come on, you all know those engineers at Google, actually wrote that code in a HEX editor in straight machine code. It is completely open source. Just because you don't know machine code, doesn't mean Google is violating open source methodology. Say you didn't know APL and I created an APL program, and gave you the source. Am I not sharing the source with you?

FYI: Tongue in cheek.