Google Chrome 81 released

[harlan4096]

Google released Chrome 81, a new stable version of the company's web browser to the public. The company announced previously that it would skip Chrome 82 to jump straight to Chrome 83 and that Chrome 83 would be released three weeks early in the middle of May.

Chrome 81 is being rolled out on all platforms at the time of writing. Desktop users can enforce the upgrade to the new version by selecting Menu > Help > About Google Chrome. The browser will pick up the new version when the page loads to download and install the update on the device. A restart is required to complete the update.

Chrome should list version 81.0.4044.92 as the version after the update on the About Chrome page.

Chrome 81 is first and foremost a security update. Google notes that it has fixed a total of 32 security issues in the new version of the web browser, some of them rated as high, the second highest severity rating after critical.

Just like Mozilla's release of Firefox 75 yesterday, Chrome 81 is low on new features or changes. Google highlights the following core changes in Chrome 81:

* WebVR Hit Testing -- An API that developers may use to place "virtual objects" into the camera's view of the real world.

* App icon badging -- The feature has graduated and may now be used by any site without restriction. It allows sites to place a bade on their icon to indicate that updates are available.

* Web NFC -- New Origin trial in Chrome 81; this one allows web applications to read and write to NFC tags.

* Media session API supports tracking the position state.

Google planned to remove TLS 1.0 and 1.1 in Chrome 81 initially but decided to postpone the change until at least Chrome 83.

Chrome 81 will upgrade images that are loaded via HTTP on HTTPS sites to HTTPS automatically or, if that fails, block them. It is possible that images won't load anymore on some sites because of that.

Additional changes, mostly of interest to web developers, are listed on the Chrome Platform Status site.
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