Is Chromium in Ubuntu's repository safe to use since it's so out of date?

Question

Is Ubuntu Chromium still safe to use since its so out of date?

Answer 1

http://www.iasptk.com/ubuntu-ppa-repositories/19353-install-latest-version-of-chromium-from-new-ppa

Install Latest Version of Chromium from new PPA

While Chromium team ppas won't release new versions of Chromium browser, Alex Shkop will try to maintain more-or-less fresh releases of Chromium. Two PPAs were built for Chromium stable and Chromium development version. Install Latest Version of Chromium: For now, two PPAs only provide packages for Ubuntu 12.04.

To add Chromium Stable PPA (currently it's version 21):

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:a-v-shkop/chromium

To add Chromium Dev PPA (currently it's version 23):

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:a-v-shkop/chromium-dev 

After added a PPA, update your repository and install Chromium:

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install chromium-browser

Answer 2

The version in the archive is current Chromium 18, that's three major stable releases behind Google Chrome, so yes, it is vulnerable for every issue Chrome has fixed in the past three releases.

Since Chromium is in universe it's really a manpower/best effort issue, whereas Firefox is in main and gets full security team support. Another option is to build/download your own Chromium or use Google Chrome, which is updated on Google's schedule. Personally I use Chrome.

• What's the difference between Google Chrome and/or Chromium? What are the advantages/disadvantages to each?

Some other options:

• how to properly Install chromium from zip and make it the default browser
• Active PPA for latest stable chromium? - This one has a disadvantage that you get new chromium but you need to enable the webapps PPA, which means you're beta testing something that isn't finished yet.