Privacy, Data & Troubleshooting

Privacy & permissions

DevTools+ by URLflows has no server and no account. Each tool runs on your computer, only when you start it, and what it shows you isn't kept or sent anywhere. It's free, forever.

Nothing is collected

No accounts: there's nothing to sign up for.
No servers of ours: the extension makes no network requests of its own. All of its code, the axe-core accessibility engine included, ships inside it.
No analytics or tracking: no usage analytics, crash reports or advertising identifiers.

What it reads, and where it goes

Pages: the inspector, Copy a container, Page info, Accessibility check, Measure, Mask PII and the page modes read the page you're on to show it to you, or change how it looks until you switch them off or reload. Mask PII changes only your screen, never what the site receives.
Grabs and recordings: go to your clipboard or your Downloads folder. Nothing is uploaded.
HAR files: hold the tab's network traffic, request and response bodies included, and are saved only to a file on your computer when you stop. They can contain sign-in cookies and tokens, so check one before you share it.
Your clipboard: read only while Clipboard inspector is open.
Settings, request rules, hidden elements and container zooms: in Chrome's local extension storage (chrome.storage.local) on this computer, never synced. So are the site switches DevTools+ changed and the extensions it switched off, so you can undo them, and 30 days of the extension's own performance numbers for the About page, which say nothing about the sites you visit.

The AI tools list and Chrome's developer pages only open pages in a tab when you click one. DevTools+ sends nothing to them.

Chrome's warnings at install

Because a developer works on any site, DevTools+ asks for a lot, and Chrome says so when you add it. You'll see warnings that it can read and change your data on all websites, use the page debugger, read data you copy and paste, capture your screen, change site settings, block content on pages, and manage your extensions. Each one belongs to a tool, as listed below, and does nothing until you start that tool.

What the permissions are for

Access to all sites (<all_urls>): so the tools run on whatever page you open, localhost and internal sites included, hidden elements and container zoom come back when a page loads, and your request rules can apply to any request.
Debugger: for Emulate, Console errors, Record a HAR file and element grabs taller than the window. It's attached to one tab only while that tool runs, and Chrome shows its "debugging this browser" bar the whole time.
Declarative net request: for the request rules you write. There are none until you add one, and the badge on the toolbar icon counts the ones that are on.
Management: for the Extensions tool, to list your extensions, reload one you're building, or switch others off and back on. It never installs or removes an extension.
Cookies, browsing data and content settings: for Cookies and storage, Clear site data (always after you confirm) and Site switches.
Tab capture, offscreen and downloads: to record the tab and save the video. The offscreen document also copies text for the right-click menu.
Desktop capture: for Full screen grab, and for Record the tab from the pop-out window, always through Chrome's own picker.
Clipboard read and clipboard write: for Clipboard inspector, and to copy what you ask for.
Context menus: the right-click items. You can switch them off in Settings → Tools.
Scripting and active tab: to start a tool on the tab you're looking at, including tabs opened before you installed the extension.
System CPU and system memory: for Browser and system info.
Storage: your settings, rules and hidden elements.

Removing your data

Use Settings → Resets → Reset all settings, or remove the extension from chrome://extensions, which deletes everything it stored. Export a backup first if you want to keep your rules and settings.

If you remove the extension

When you remove DevTools+ from Chrome, Chrome opens a short feedback form in a new tab. Answering is optional, and you can just close the tab. The extension sends nothing to the form: the form's link only says which extension you removed. The form is hosted by Airtable, so anything you type there goes to Airtable and to us, under Airtable's privacy policy.