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So it turns out that Google Chrome was making everything on my computer slow *even when it wasn’t running*, because it installs something called Keystone which is basically malware.
I made a website because this shouldn’t happen: https://chromeisbad.com
I made a website because this shouldn’t happen: https://chromeisbad.com
Wired first reported on how bad Keystone was 11 years ago when they put it into Google Earth (they seem to put it in all their popular downloads). https://www.wired.com/2009/02/why-googles-sof/
The fact that Keystone hides itself in Activity Monitor is bizarre. (The only sign of it was excessive CPU usage of WindowServer which is a system process).
I don’t know if Google was doing something nefarious with Keystone, or a third party figured out how to (which Wired warned about). But either way, I’m not inclined to give Google-the-organization the benefit of the doubt (despite the many good people who work on Chrome)...
...since it's been a decade+ and this still hasn't been "fixed".
There is no reason for auto-update software to need to do what Chrome/Keystone was doing. It also has a long history of crashing Macs.
There is no reason for auto-update software to need to do what Chrome/Keystone was doing. It also has a long history of crashing Macs.
Chrome is bad. There is no reason it should make everything slow *when it’s not running* (it shouldn’t make everything slow when it is running either). There are other good browsers based on Chromium (Brave, Vivaldi), and Safari is fast & lightweight too. https://chromeisbad.com
Collecting anecdotes here — https://twitter.com/lorenb/timelines/1338892756752732169
