This privacy policy describes how Home Screen New Tab (“the Extension”) handles information when you use it. The Extension is free software developed by Oisin McGrath (“I”, “me”, “the developer”) under the MIT License.
Plain summary: the Extension collects nothing. There is no account, no server of mine, no telemetry and no analytics. Everything you configure stays in your own browser. I never receive any information about you, your tiles, your searches or your browsing.
This document is not legal advice. For the “use at your own risk” rules, see the
LICENSE file shipped with the Extension.
1. What the Extension is
Home Screen New Tab replaces the new tab page in Chromium-based browsers with a grid of shortcuts you add yourself, a clock, an optional weather block, an optional sunrise/sunset countdown, a battery readout, a search bar and a bar for sending a question to an AI assistant. It runs entirely inside your browser. It is not a hosted service and has no login of any kind.
2. What is stored, and where it stays
All of the following is written to your browser's own storage on your own
machine — localStorage and IndexedDB belonging to the
Extension — and is never transmitted anywhere:
- Your tiles: their names, addresses, and any icons you upload
- Cached site icons, stored so they are only ever fetched once
- Your chosen search engine and AI assistant
- Which widgets you have switched on
- Your chosen weather location and the most recent forecast
- Saved profiles, each holding the above under a name you choose
I have no access to any of it. Exporting a profile writes a JSON file to your own download folder; nothing is uploaded.
3. Network activity
The Extension makes exactly three kinds of request, all made directly by your own browser to the party named, and none of them to any server of mine:
| Request | When | What is sent |
|---|---|---|
| To a site you added a tile for | That tile has no icon cached yet | An ordinary request for its apple-touch-icon.png or favicon.ico |
To icons.duckduckgo.com |
The above failed | The hostname of that site, so their icon service can return an icon for it |
To open-meteo.com |
You switched weather or the countdown on | The latitude and longitude of the location you picked by name |
The first two happen only if you grant the optional host permission described in section 4. Results are cached, so a given site's icon is fetched once and the forecast at most every thirty minutes.
Beyond that, the Extension only ever navigates your browser: clicking a tile opens that site, the search bar opens your chosen search engine with your query, and the assistant bar opens your chosen assistant with your question. Those are ordinary visits to those sites, subject to their own privacy policies, exactly as if you had typed the address yourself. The Extension does not read, log or transmit them.
4. Permissions, and why each is needed
-
favicon— reads the icon your browser has already cached for a site, used as a last resort when a tile's icon cannot be found otherwise. It reveals nothing to anyone; the lookup is local. -
downloads— writes an exported profile to your download folder without the browser asking you to choose one every time. It is used for nothing else, and never reads your downloads. -
Access to websites (
https://*/*,http://*/*) — optional, and not granted when you install the Extension. It is requested only if you agree, and is used solely to fetch site icons. It is broad because a tile can point at any address, including a device on your own network served over plain HTTP. If you refuse it, the Extension never touches the network for icons and tiles fall back to your browser's icon cache, then to a letter.
5. No accounts, no cloud storage, no tracking
There is no registration, no sign-in, no synchronisation and no cloud component. The Extension contains no analytics, no telemetry, no advertising identifiers and no third-party tracking code of any kind.
6. No sale or transfer of data
I do not collect your data, so there is nothing for me to sell, rent or transfer. The Extension's use of any information is limited to providing the features described here, in line with the Chrome Web Store User Data Policy including its Limited Use requirements. Nothing is used for advertising, for creditworthiness or lending decisions, or for building a profile of you, and no human reads your data, because none of it reaches me.
7. Retention and deletion
Everything the Extension stores lives in your browser until you remove it. Clearing the icon cache under Settings, deleting a profile, or uninstalling the Extension removes the corresponding data from your machine. Since nothing is held anywhere else, there is nothing to request the deletion of.
8. Children
The Extension is not directed at children and collects no information from anyone, including children.
9. Free software and honesty about risk
The Extension is free software provided as-is, without warranty. Its full source is published at github.com/oisinmcgrath/homescreen-newtab, and every claim on this page can be checked against it. If you install a modified copy from anywhere other than the Chrome Web Store or that repository, this policy does not describe what that copy does.
10. This website
oisinmcgrath.com serves static pages from Cloudflare Pages. It sets no cookies and runs no analytics, advertising or tracking scripts. Cloudflare processes standard request logs as part of serving the site.
11. Changes
If the Extension's behaviour changes in a way that affects this policy, I will update this page and the “Last updated” date.
12. Contact
Privacy questions about Home Screen New Tab: [email protected]
Developer: Oisin McGrath · github.com/oisinmcgrath