Is Car Tab safe?

Low risk

Car Tab sends the hostnames of frequently visited sites to Google's favicon service when the new tab opens.

Car Tab replaces the browser's new-tab page and reads Chrome's topSites list to build its shortcuts. For each listed site, it loads an icon from www.google.com/s2/favicons using the site's hostname in the request, so Google receives those frequently visited domains when the page renders.

Zephyr Onev1.3.0Chrome Web Store
17Risk

AI-generated. Findings may contain errors. Those marked Verified have been manually reviewed.

Publishers can request a review.

Findings

Car Tab's new tab page sends your top sites to Google

Every time you open a new tab, Car Tab reads your Chrome top-sites list and requests a Google favicon for each site, sending Google each site's hostname.

We observed this on every new tab, with no consent prompt.

Severity
Low unwanted
Type
Unexpected
CWE
CWE-359
Source
Dynamic sandbox
What actually happens
You did this

You open a new tab in Chrome.

Car Tab overrides the default new tab page with its own page.

The extension did this

Car Tab reads your browser's top-sites list and sends each site's hostname to Google's favicon service.

This happens automatically, before you interact with the page.

Captured request
GEThttps://www.google.com/s2/favicons?sz=48&domain_url=chatgpt.com

200 OK, a 48px favicon image returned for the requested hostname.

The code that does this

Top-sites widget builds a Google favicon URL from each site's hostname

Readable version

Renamed for readability, same logic

function buildFaviconUrl(site) {  return `https://www.google.com/s2/favicons?sz=48&domain_url=${new URL(site.url).hostname}`;}function getTopSites(callback) {  if (self.chrome && chrome.topSites) {    return void chrome.topSites.get(callback);  }  callback([ /* fallback list used only when chrome.topSites is unavailable */ ]);}// Runs on every new tab loadTopSitesWidget.init = () => new Promise((resolve) => {  getTopSites(function (topSites) {    // Each rendered tile's <img src> is buildFaviconUrl(site), one Google request per site    render(createElement(TopSitesWidget, { topSites }), document.getElementById("top-sites-widget-root"), resolve);  });});
What each favicon request tells Google
  • Visited site hostname
    chatgpt.com

    The domain of one of the sites Chrome has recorded as one of your most-visited.

  • Requested icon size
    48

    The favicon pixel size requested; the same on every request and not identifying by itself.

Where your top-sites data goes
    • www.google.com

    Receives a request containing the hostname of each of your top-visited sites, once per new tab opened, via its public favicon lookup endpoint. Operated by Google.

What it can do

Permissions this extension asks for, as declared in version 1.3.0. Asking for a permission is not a finding on its own - it is what the extension can do if it chooses to.

  • Read and change your data on api.openweathermap.org

    https://api.openweathermap.org/data/2.5/*

  • Store data in your browser

    storage

  • Read your physical location

    geolocation

  • Read the sites you visit most

    topSites

Where it sends data

Destinations our analysis observed Car Tab contacting. Sending data somewhere is not a finding on its own - an extension that syncs your settings has to talk to its own server - but it is where your data can go, and who else it goes to.

  • www.google.comwidely used

    Car Tab sends data to www.google.com. A widely used service: 153 other extensions we have analysed send data here.

Updated 30 September 2026nkmfllljojihllecklmngmdhnfdjcdei