This same thing happened to me on a Windows 10 laptop this morning, that has no relation to the computer in the original report (Windows 8.1). The CPU usage was less though it was a combined 30% with a process and two spawned processes running the same test. Same version of Chrome.

termsrv@ Thanks for the issue.

Tested this issue on Windows 10 and Mac OS 10.12.6 on the reported version 64.0.3282.140 and cannot observe any increase in CPU usage through software_reporter_tool is present in the system files.
From the above description looks like this is a Feature Request to disable software_reporter_tool from "C:\Users\[REMOVED]\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\.

Marking this issue as Untriaged for further updates from Dev.

Thanks..

Thank you for testing but please don't dismiss this as can't repro. It's unlikely that, by chance, two separate systems with nothing in common except Chrome (AFAIK) are running the same test and eating cpu within a day of each other. So I think there's something happening there, clearly someone at Google is using this tool to run tests on a user's computer. On a laptop specifically you use the battery when you do that so I suggest an opt-in rather than opt-out.

In the case of both laptops Chrome was downloaded with an _unchecked_ "Help make Google Chrome better by automatically sending usage statistics and crash reports to Google." Which I would think means Chrome shouldn't be doing that. The installer which was downloaded from https://www.google.com/chrome/?system=true&standalone=1&platform=win64 shows usagestats=0 in a hex dump of the file.

Again with Chrome 65.0.3325.181 on Windows 8.1 x64 and swreporter 27.146.200, running NewCleanerUIExperiment, using 30% CPU

Just saw this for the first time, right after today's beta update.  Chrome 66.0.3359.66 (Official Build) beta (64-bit) (cohort: Beta).  Chrome had 2-3 Software Reporter Tool processes going, and one of them kept the CPU maxed for several minutes (along with Antimalware Service Executable) even after closing the browser.

Or rather, it kept one core maxed (25% CPU).

Past issues with Software Reporter Tool seem to be 

Hi,

The software reporter is scanning the systems for unwanted software. If it finds any it will prompt people to run the Chrome Cleanup tool[1]. If you aren't opted into sending metrics back, no information from the reporter is sent back.

I'm sorry to hear that the tool is noticeable, we try to run it infrequently enough, with a low priority and with a timeout, to prevent cases like these.

What is the longest you've seen the tool running for? How frequently are you seeing this issue? 

It could also be helpful if you're willing to share the *.log files in C:\Users\{user}\AppData\Local\Google\Software Reporter Tool\, which could help give us an idea about what is causing the problems.

Thanks


[1]https://www.google.com/chrome/cleanup-tool/

Can you give me a system setting to stop it? It seems to happen per user. It ran for 10 minutes I think.

I can share the most-recent bits of my logs (with username edited out), apparently corresponding to the time I noticed high CPU.  (Hmm, it says it couldn't find my hiberfil, pagefile, and swapfile, but those all exist.)

Deleted: software_reporter_tool_logs_2018-03-28.zip 3.1 KB

software_reporter_tool_logs_2018-03-28.zip 3.1 KB Download

Looks like this feature was news to some people:

https://yro.slashdot.org/story/18/04/02/2041254/chrome-is-scanning-files-on-your-computer-and-people-are-freaking-out

The timing makes me think the scanner must've changed behavior recently for people to suddenly notice its existence.  Or it could just be a coincidence.

Thanks for the logs mkterra@.

We have a big customer reporting the same issue. They also need a way to disable this feature.

 crbug.com/834939  is tracking the request to have a group policy to disable this feature.

This bug is only tracking efforts to improve the functionality of the feature, not disable it.

Just happened to me again on Chrome 67.0.3396.62 (Official Build) beta (64-bit) (cohort: Beta), and made running other programs a pain for several minutes.

Confirm also. Ridiculously slowed down performance.

I solved it by adding a software restriction policy for software_reporter_tool.exe as 'Disallowed'. No more complaints so I'm pretty sure it's working.

secpol.msc / gpedit.msc > Security Settings > Software Restriction Policies > Additional Rules

I reiterate that if the installer does not have send statistics back to Google set then this should not be running. Shady practice.

This tool needs to run, even when it doesn't seem statistics back, to see if there is any unwanted software on the system that the Chrome Cleanup Tool can offer to remove (by showing the user a prompt). Without running the reporter we can't tell if we should offer the cleaner or not.

This bug has an owner, thus, it's been triaged. Changing status to "assigned".