For years anyone interested in learning the version of Flash installed in their web browser has been directed to this Adobe page: adobe.com/software/flash/about/.
For the last couple days it has reported that, for the Chrome browser on Windows, the latest and greatest version of the Flash Player is 21.0.0.213.
This is not true.
Chome on Windows is running a version of the Flash Player that is newer than what Adobe reports as the latest.
I stumbled across this after reading about the latest clump of 24 Flash Player bug fixes. The bugs were serious, so I dutifully updated Chrome and verified that I had the latest version of Flash. I didn't. As shown above, the tester page reported that I was running 21.0.0.216 which is newer than the 21.0.0.213 that Adobe said was the latest.
So, I asked Google.
A spokesperson for the company said, by email, that they had made updates and minor bug fixes to version 21.0.0.213 and that 21.0.0.216 was indeed the latest and greatest.
Not only is Adobe's tester page behind the times, so too is their last Security Bulletin. On the other hand, Google too, failed to say anything about this.
I had only asked Google about Windows, and my initial testing showed that what Adobe reports as the latest version for Chrome on OS X (21.0.0.213) and Chrome OS (21.0.0.197) were both accurate.
But not for long.
According to the Google spokesperson, they are in the process of updating the Flash Player used by Chrome on Windows, OS X and Linux. The update is being deployed "independently of Chrome via the component updater."
I am no expert on this, but my previous experience has been that when Google uses this particular update mechanism, there is nothing end users can do to force an update. We just have to wait.
Finally, I was told that the Flash Player on Chrome OS is likely to be updated today.
Adobe reports on the Flash Player in Windows, OS X, Linux and Solaris, but not Chrome OS.
Speaking of Chrome OS, it is missing in action on Adobe's Flash tester page. As you see above, Adobe reports on Windows, OS X, Linux and Solaris. Like Rodney Dangerfield, Chrome OS gets no respect.
Finally, if the URL for Adobe's tester page is too long for you to remember (it is for me), then you will find a link to it at the top of my FlashTester.org website.