Malicious Chromium extension spoofs Perplexity AI to hijack browser searches
Summary
A malicious browser extension pretended to be Perplexity AI (an AI-powered search tool) to trick users into installing it, then secretly intercepted their search queries and routed them through attacker-controlled servers before forwarding them to real search engines. The extension was hard to detect because users still received normal search results, and attackers exploited user trust in popular AI brands rather than exploiting actual browser vulnerabilities. Google removed the extension after Microsoft researchers discovered and reported it.
Solution / Mitigation
Microsoft Threat Intelligence reported the extension to Google, which subsequently removed it from its extension store.
Classification
Affected Vendors
Related Issues
Original source: https://www.csoonline.com/article/4191060/malicious-chromium-extension-spoofs-perplexity-ai-to-hijack-browser-searches.html
First tracked: June 30, 2026 at 08:00 AM
Classified by LLM (prompt v3) · confidence: 85%