Privacy Policy — AdSurfer

Last updated: 2026-09-09

Summary

AdSurfer has no account, no backend and no analytics. It does not collect, transmit or sell any personal data. Everything it produces stays on your computer, and the only servers it ever contacts are Google’s own — the same ones your browser would contact if you used the Ads Transparency Center directly.

What is stored, and where

Everything below lives on your device only, in Chrome’s extension storage and in your browser’s IndexedDB. None of it is uploaded anywhere.

Chrome extension storage (chrome.storage.local)

Key	Contents
`competitors`	The advertisers and domains you chose to save: id, name, country, domain, and timestamps
`settings`	Your preferences — export toggles, ads-per-scan limit, slow mode
`scanJob`	The state of a scan in progress, so it survives the popup closing
`license`	If you bought a licence: the key you pasted and the email address it was issued to
`lockedTarget`	On the free plan, which single scan the dashboard is unlocked for

IndexedDB (database adt-dashboard)

Store	Contents
`snapshots`	Scan metadata — target, date, ad count, size
`snapshotRows`	The ads collected in each scan: advertiser, creative id, dates, format, asset URLs
`snapshotAux`	Derived caches — image fingerprints and resolved preview links
`jobPages`	Checkpoints of a scan in progress, deleted when it completes

All of this is public advertising data published by Google, plus your own choices about what to scan. Deleting the extension deletes all of it.

Network activity

The extension makes requests to these hosts, and to no others:

Host	Why	Sends your Google session?
`adstransparency.google.com`	Reads advertiser and ad data — the extension’s whole purpose	Background scans: no (sent without cookies). Search-as-you-type in the popup: yes, through the open tab, exactly as the site itself does
`tpc.googlesyndication.com`	Downloads the creative images you choose to save	No
`displayads-formats.googleusercontent.com`	Reads the preview script for video and responsive ads to find their thumbnail	No
`i.ytimg.com`	Displays YouTube thumbnails for video creatives	No

No analytics, no tracking, no error reporting, no third-party servers. The extension never sends your competitor list, your scans, your licence key or any identifier to anyone, including the author.

Links to youtube.com and linkedin.com appear in the interface. Nothing is sent to them unless you click.

Permissions and why each is needed

Permission	Purpose
`storage`	Save your competitor list, settings and scans locally
`unlimitedStorage`	One scan can hold up to 10,000 ads; the default quota cannot archive several scans
`downloads`	Write the images and CSV/JSON files you export to your Downloads folder
`scripting`	Inject a helper into an open Ads Transparency Center tab so search requests come from that page
`alarms`	Resume an interrupted scan after Chrome shuts the extension’s background worker down
Host access to the four hosts listed above	See the table above

Your data, your control

Delete a scan — the Storage tab in the dashboard removes any scan and its ads permanently.
Delete everything — removing the extension from Chrome erases all of the above, including your licence. Keep the email containing your key if you plan to reinstall.
Export — your competitor list and every scan can be exported to CSV or JSON at any time.

Children

AdSurfer is a professional research tool and is not directed at children.

Changes

Material changes to this policy will be reflected here with a new date, and the version of the extension they apply to.

Contact

Kostia Zhushman — https://www.linkedin.com/in/kostia-zhushman-93383a115/