Google Releases New Chrome Update to Patch Dozens of New Browser Vulnerabilities

Google has rolled out the first round of updates to its Chrome
web browser for 2022 to fix 37 security issues, one of which is
rated Critical in severity and could be exploited to pass arbitrary
code and gain control over a victim’s system.

Tracked as CVE-2022-0096^[1], the flaw relates to a
use-after-free bug^[2]
in the Storage component, which could have devastating effects
ranging from corruption of valid data to the execution of malicious
code on a compromised machine.

Security researcher Yangkang (@dnpushme^[3]) of Qihoo 360 ATA, who
has previously disclosed zero-day vulnerabilities^[4] in Apple’s WebKit, has
been credited with discovering and reporting the flaw on November
30, 2021.

It’s also worth pointing out that 24 of the 37 uncovered flaws
came from external researchers, including its Google Project Zero
initiative, while the others were flagged as part of its ongoing
internal security work. Of the 24 bugs, 10 are rated High, another
10 are rated Medium, and three are rated as Low in severity.

The updates arrive after a busy 2021, which saw the search giant
remediating as many as 17 zero-day bugs^[5]
in the Chrome browser that were observed to be actively exploited
in the wild.

Chrome users are recommended to update to the latest version
(97.0.4692.71) for Windows, Mac, and Linux by heading to Settings
> Help > ‘About Google Chrome’ to mitigate any potential risk
of active exploitation.