Half of Chrome AI extensions are harvesting your data - see the surprising worst offenders

New research shows coding, transcription, and other productivity tools proved the most invasive, though several other categories are worth watching as well.

Follow ZDNET: Add us as a preferred source on Google.

ZDNET's key takeaways

• Browser extensions are tracking more of your data.
• Many AI productive tools are collecting tons of personal information.
• Users should be wary of unjustifiable permissions requests.

Browser extensions have increasingly been a security risk as publishers get sneakier about the code they can hide in them. AI is only increasing that threat, especially when it comes to tracking user data -- and some of your most commonly used apps are doing a lot of the scraping. 

New research from data removal service Incogni finds that more than half of a sample set of AI Chrome extensions collect user data. Almost a third are "gathering personally identifiable information ...