Question regarding CEF folder and WidewineCDM

[Ginga]

I'm currently in the process of doing some cleaning on my computer.

Last night I noticed a folder titled CEF under AppData Local.

Basically I'd just like to ask people on this forum if this sounds legitimate or if it's something I should be concerned about.

 

I will try an be as specific as possible with the details and the included files.

 

Opening the CEF folder reveals a folder titled User Data which contains 2 other folders titled Dictionaries and WidevineCDM.

 

Dictionaries is empty, but WidevineCDM contains a folder titled 1.4.8.824 (current version?).

 

Said folder contains 3 other folders _metadata, _platform_specific and imgs aloung with two files named manifest.fingerprint (0 bytes in size) and manifest.json (957 bytes in size).

 

The folder imgs simply contains a single PNG image in form of a Google coloured lock of sorts.

 

The folder _metadata contains a file titled verified_contents.json (1,47 kb in size).

 

The folder _platform_specific contains the folder named win_x86 which reveals the 2 .dll files widevinecdm.dll and widevinecdmadapter.dll and another file titled CdmAdapterVersion (12 bytes in size).

 

The details for the widevinecdm.dll file claims that it's author is Google and the author for the widevinecdmadapter.dll is The Chromium Authors.

(screenshot added for more specific file details and pardon the lack of english language).

 

 

All files comes out as clean according to Malwarebytes Free and Nod 32 Antivirus 8 and the Eset Rogue Application Remover claims that my system is fine.

 

After doing a bit of Google I can understand that all of these Widevine files is very much the product of Google and is used as some sort of DRM for video services such as YouTube and Netflix? (Please correct me if I'm wrong.) And it sounds like it might be related to using the HTML5 player instead of Flash?

It also sounds like these files are auto installed onto the system without the users approvral, which comes of as a little sketchy to me.

 

I haven't had used Adobe Flash Player for ages due to security concerns and I have Silverlight installed for the use with Netflix.

I'm not even using Google's Chrome browser, nor do I have it installed. I'm currently using the latest version of Internet Explorer with ActiveX filtering and other increased security settings.

I am however using Gmail which obviously requires me to log into Google's services.

 

So basically, does all of this sound right that these Widewine related programs are installed on my system when I don't even use the Chrome browser, or are they browser indiffrent?

If someone knows of these things and can explain these it I would be very grateful

I can't really seem to find any information regarding these programs when your browser is IE. All that really comes up is Chrome related topics.

 

 

　

[David H. Lipman]

If you don't know what they are, leave them alone so you won't break some application.

 

Worry about;  Temporary Internet Folder ( TIF ) and other Browser caches, TEMP folders and other things that are resultant from processes, not the things software may have dependencies on.

[fivealive]

That folder is created by steam.

[Ginga]

That folder is created by steam.

I do have Steam installed with quite a few games, so that is probably the cause.

Thank you for clearing out the origin of the folder :-)

 

And thank you David for the tips regarding temp folders.

[fivealive]

Your welcome, I actually came across that folder my self a couple months ago, took me a little while to figure out the cause.

[Cartel]

I have the CEF folder but I never have had steam...