Chrome gives users insight into app and extension activity

Chrome will give users insight into exactly what apps and extensions do for its browser. Users gain visibility into their extensions’ activity through an update to the Chrome Apps & Extensions Developer Tool introduced last year.

Chrome introduced the Apps & Extensions Developer Tool last year to make it easier for developers to debug apps and extensions. Once the new version of the tool is installed, it will start monitoring the activities of all installed apps and extensions while the user is using them. For each app and extension, the tool creates a log containing all activities performed up to a few days ago.

In a special privacy section, the tool highlights activities in which the app or extension has accessed information from the user, read cookies from sites or modified websites. In addition to the log, the tool now has a section that shows the current activity of apps and extensions. In that section, developers can also view the flow of system calls; this would be helpful in detecting glitches or unnecessary system calls.