Preliminary research

The Masks We (Think We) Wear: Privacy Threats of Browser-Extension Wallets in the Web3 Ecosystem

Weihong Wang, Yana Dimova, Victor Vansteenkiste, Tom Van Goethem and Tom Van Cutsem · Proceedings on Privacy Enhancing Technologies

AI-collected research leads through 22 September 2026, including targeted additions between broader sweeps. Unranked, incomplete, not community-vetted, and subject to change.

A browser-extension wallet is both a blockchain client and an identity provider, and five privacy threats follow from doing both in a page. Measuring 85 Chrome wallets covering 35.16M users: routine RPC calls link a user's separate addresses, most Ethereum wallets keep exposing an address after its permission is revoked, and many inject their provider into cross-origin iframes.

Record

Researcher

Weihong Wang, Yana Dimova, Victor Vansteenkiste, Tom Van Goethem and Tom Van Cutsem

Published by

Proceedings on Privacy Enhancing Technologies

Format

Whitepaper

Topic

Browser

In the archive

• Collected in the 2026 preliminary research sweep

Related sources

• The Masks We (Think We) Wear: Privacy Threats of Browser-Extension Wallets in the Web3 Ecosystem (Preprint)
• Code Repository

Tags

• browser-extension
• blockchain
• deanonymization
• info-leak
• measurement-study
• iframe
• browser-fingerprinting

This page is the archive's own catalogue record. The research is the work of Weihong Wang, Yana Dimova, Victor Vansteenkiste, Tom Van Goethem and Tom Van Cutsem, first published at the original source. Preserved copies are kept so the citation survives its host; this one was last captured on 19 August 2026.