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Thursday, 9th September 2010.

Silent Downloader

Posted on Tuesday, 18th March 2008 by Auw Jimmy

I tried to download Google Earth. I searched around and found this link. I downloaded the Google Updater and after few clicks, I downloaded the Google Earth. Google would use this Google Updater to download Google software just like the screen shot below. You decided the software that you wanted to download (on the web) and Google Updater would then download by this Google Updater.

As easy as A B C, right?

Then, the download process continued. I checked my NetLimiter to view the current download speed. But my traffic was zero! What? But the Google Updater kept downloading (the progress bar showed this). How come?

I couldn’t believe this. Then I launched my Outpost Firewall. On the application tree, there were no Google Updater or any suspicious applications. I suspected the SVCHOST.EXE. Voila… I saw that one of the SVCHOST.EXE has gpdl.google.com remote address. Hmm… And it was downloading something. Quite fast.

I didn’t know why Google preferred to use this “silent” downloading process. Maybe they were just want to make some fun by using the SVCHOST.EXE as downloader (some genius engineer or programmer usually like to do something in “unusual” way). Hope they didn’t do “something”.

Posted in IT/Gadget | Comments (1)

One Response to “Silent Downloader”

MysTerry317 Says:
March 27th, 2009 at 07:02
Jimmy,
Did you ever figure out what “Silent Downloader” (SD) was downloading? I’ve found that SD seems to be connected somehow to my The Weather Channel Desktop and wanted to download a spybot “SmartShopper” as a gift for upgrading my Weather Channel Desktop to the same program with no changes except for this “smartshopper” crap and then when I deny the installation SD pops up and makes me select to “quit”. It’s very frustrating because now I can’t get TWC to uninstall.
Terry