USE CASE
Check a website's operator details before entering personal information
Before entering details on a shopping, booking or sign-up page, check what it says about who runs the site. This guide shows how to use Site Operator Check.
This extension does not judge whether a site is safe. It shows what the page says about its operator, and what it does not say. Something being absent does not mean the site is dangerous.
A site's appearance does not tell you who runs it
You arrive at a site for the first time from a search or a social post. The goods or the service may look fine, but the moment you ask “who actually runs this”, the answer is scattered across the footer, an about page, the terms and the privacy policy.
It is worth one look, especially when the next thing you type is an address, a phone number or a card.
Operator details do not establish that a site is safe
A company name or familiar payment service does not establish that a site is safe. Missing company details do not prove it is dangerous either. Site Operator Check does not make those judgements.
What it shows is what the page itself says.
The same job with Site Operator Check
- 1
Open the site you want to look at.
- 2
Press the Site Operator Check icon.
- 3
Choose “Check this page’s operator”.
- 4
Read what the page states as its company name, address and contact details.
- 5
If you want to go further, open the excerpt each value came from.
- 6
Whether to type anything in is your call.
Stated
Written where a site names itself as the operator: a legal notice, structured data, the terms.
Hint
A company name in the footer, a site name in the metadata — operator-like, but not a claim to be one.
Not confirmed
Could not be confirmed from the page you are on. What could not be found is shown rather than hidden.
These are the rows the panel lists. They are kept apart rather than merged into one answer.
It reads only the page you have open. An about page or a legal notice is offered as a link and never opened for you. It does not work on chrome:// pages, the Chrome Web Store, the PDF viewer or local files, which Chrome puts out of reach.
What this looks like in practice
A shop you have never bought from
Before the delivery address and the card details go in, see what the page says about the company behind it.
A booking service you are using for the first time
Before a name, a phone number and an email address are registered, look for a company name and an address.
Signing up to a web service
Check which company, which region and which governing law the terms and the privacy policy name.
Trying a new service for work
Not only where your input goes, but where data is stored and which other origins the page loads — as the page itself states them.
What Site Operator Check does
- Looks for the operator details written on the page
- Lists company name, address and contact details as separate rows
- Shows where each value was written, as an excerpt
- Marks what it could not find as “not found” rather than leaving it out
- Points to likely related pages — terms, an about page and the like
What Site Operator Check does not do
- Rule a site safe or dangerous
- Prove that the company named actually exists
- Guarantee that what is written is true
- Stop you from typing or sending anything
The extension shows the operator information stated on the page to help you decide whether to share your details. It does not make that decision for you. It is primarily designed for Japanese websites.
The tool for this job
How far it reads, the permissions it asks for and the privacy details are all set out on the product page.
Site Operator Check A Chrome extension that shows the operator details written on a page, each with its evidence See what it does →