Chrome extension slurps up AI chats after users installed it for privacy

Researchers disclosed that a Chrome and Edge VPN browser extension (Urban VPN Proxy) pushed an update that began capturing conversations with multiple AI assistants (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Copilot, Perplexity, DeepSeek, Grok, Meta AI) and sending prompts and responses to a data-broker company (BiScience). The extension silently auto-updated many users from a benign version to the harvesting version, and seven sibling extensions contained identical code, putting over seven million users' potentially sensitive AI chat content at risk; the extensions were removed from the Chrome Web Store after disclosure.