AI browsers want to control how you experience and interact with the internet. Should you let them take over?

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August 5th, 2025 // Did someone forward you this newsletter? Sign up to receive your own copy here. ([link removed] )

Your browser wants to be your AI assistant

The way we interact with the web is undergoing a rapid evolution. For years, the browser—the tool we rely on to access the internet—has remained relatively unchanged. But with the arrival of AI browsers, we could be entering uncharted territory.

Unlike traditional browsers, these new tools don’t just help us navigate the web. They navigate it for us. Designed to act on our behalf, AI browsers will mark a new chapter in how we engage with information online, as well as how AI companies compete for our data and attention.

In this newsletter, we take a closer look at the wave of AI browsers launching this summer and what they might mean for the future of how we experience the internet.

// What’s an AI browser?

Traditional web browsers are built to display information—like websites and search results. AI browsers go further. In addition to showing websites, they use underlying AI systems to interpret information, make decisions, and take action. For example, while still early and imperfect, AI browsers can:

- Understand what you're looking at and answer questions about it. You can converse with a split-screen chatbot as you read an article or digest content from a website.
- Summarize complex content right in your browser. If you don’t want to watch a long YouTube podcast, your AI browser can summarize its key points.
- Automate routine tasks like form filling, scheduling, and shopping. For example, if you’re booking a flight, it can scan your calendar, notice you have a morning meeting the day you planned to leave, and suggest afternoon departures instead.

AI browsers create a native integration between the browser and AI chatbots and agents, enabling a user to collaborate with and delegate to AI tools as they navigate around the internet.

Josh Miller, the CEO of The Browser Company, a company launching a new AI browser called Dia, described it like this in a post ([link removed] ) : “Traditional browsers were built to load webpages. But increasingly, webpages—apps, articles, and files—will become tool calls with AI chat interfaces. In many ways, chat interfaces are already acting like browsers: they search, read, generate, respond.”

The competition is heating up amongst companies building next-gen browsers. In addition to The Browser Company's Dia browser ([link removed] ) , Perplexity just launched Comet ([link removed] ) , and OpenAI is about to launch ([link removed] ) its own browser. Meanwhile, Google has begun enhancing its popular Chrome browser with Gemini plugins ([link removed] ) , including an AI search product ([link removed] ) .

// The history of browsers

The latest competition between browsers is not the first time tech companies have squared off. There is a long history of companies vying to be our go-to platform when opening a new tab.

- The first browser wars began in the 1990s, when Netscape Navigator dominated the market. But then Microsoft bundled Internet Explorer with Windows, displacing Netscape and prompting a Department of Justice antitrust suit ([link removed] .) . Though Microsoft ultimately prevailed on appeal, the damage was done: Netscape lost its foothold and the battle.
- The second round of the browser wars took place from 2004 to 2017, when Microsoft’s Internet Explorer faced off against Mozilla’s Firefox and Google’s Chrome browser. Google Chrome, launched in 2008, surpassed Internet Explorer to become the dominant web browser, a position it still holds today, with a 68% share ([link removed] ) of the global browser market.

While it’s unlikely to lose that position anytime soon, Chrome now faces pressure.

// Why the browser wars are heating up

To understand why the browser wars are heating up, it’s valuable to be reminded of what people use the internet for.

In 2025, “finding information” remains the single greatest motivation for going online, with 62.8% of adult internet users ([link removed] ) worldwide citing this as their primary reason for logging on.

The search for information has fueled the rise of search engines like Google. But times are changing, and people are finding their information differently now:

- AI chatbots are upending how people search and find information on the web. Instead of typing a query into a search bar, users are engaging in dialogue with chatbots. More than 800 million people use ChatGPT every week ([link removed] ) to search for and make sense of the internet’s information. The new term is AEO ([link removed] ) (answer engine optimization), not SEO. Dotdash Meredith, an online publisher that owns a variety of brands like People said on a recent earnings call that traffic from Google was about 50% of what it was one year ago ([link removed] ) . Business Insider is laying off 21% of its staff to “endure extreme traffic drops ([link removed] ) .” Google Search has even changed how it delivers information. Its AI overviews that summarize the answer to a search have served more than 1.5 billion people ([link removed] .) . The result? No need to click into actual links; the information is right there.
- The ad-based business model is fueled by search. Google Chrome makes up about 75% of Alphabet's ad-specific revenue ([link removed] ) . It’s a free browser, but it helps Google target ads to users, and it routes users to the Google search engine by default. If OpenAI and Perplexity build browsers around their own chatbots, they will begin to compete for Google’s browser and search-engine market share. Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas said ([link removed] ) , “If people are in the browser, it’s infinite retention.”

The browser is no longer just the launching point for the rest of the internet. It becomes the internet.

// The new role of browsers

AI browsers want to be a user’s companion, research intern, and thought-partner. No longer are they blank-slate windows for the user to populate with tabs. Now, a browser wants to be a co-conspirator in the searching, finding, and sense-making of navigating the web.

But how much actual navigating will humans do? As AI agents like OpenAI’s Operator ([link removed] ) improve, it may be these agents (not people) interacting with websites, executing tasks, and pulling information on our behalf.

As Casey Newton wrote in Platformer ([link removed] ) last month, “The question remains, though, what will be left to browse. The entire structure of the web—from journalism to e-commerce and beyond—is built on the idea that webpages are being viewed by people. When it's mostly code that is doing the looking, a lot of basic assumptions are going to get broken.”

This shift could accelerate the compression and flattening of the internet: sites built for bots, content designed for summarization, and advertising embedded in chatbot responses. In this new paradigm, the AI agent becomes the browser’s primary user.

// The data privacy imperative

There’s a bigger question, however. Are we willing to cede control to our AI agents in the first place?

To become this central operating platform for the internet, AI browsers will need unprecedented access to our data and sensitive information.

Do we want to give an AI browser (and its embedded AI agent) access to our emails, our calendar, and our Amazon Prime account so it can complete purchases?

For AI browsers to live up to their potential, they’ll need access and control over our private information—information that we don’t own and barely control.

All of this underscores the importance of data privacy and the need to own and control our data. Whether it’s in chatbots or new browsers, the existence of agentic AI systems will require new approaches, tools, and policies that enable people to exercise their agency.

This is the heart of Project Liberty’s work: building solutions that help people take back control of their digital lives.

Project Liberty news & updates

// An article in Co-op News ([link removed] ) covered Project Liberty Institute’s new report on Data Cooperatives, emphasizing how the co-op model can empower people in a world dominated by tech giants.

📰 Other notable headlines

// 🔢 Ready or not, age verification is beginning to roll out across the internet, according to an article in The Verge ([link removed] ) . (Paywall).

// 🇨🇴 Meta brought AI to rural Colombia. Now students are failing exams. Rather than boosting learning, it’s getting in the way, according to an article in Rest of World ([link removed] ) . (Free).

// 👨‍💻 Workers are spilling secrets to AI chatbots, according to an article in Axios ([link removed] ) . Sensitive corporate data appeared in more than 4% of generative AI prompts and over 20% of uploaded files in the second quarter of this year. (Free).

// 💵 Big Tech giants have spent more on AI ($155B) than the US government has on education, jobs, and social services in 2025 so far, according to an article in The Guardian ([link removed] ) . (Free).

// 🦺 Is anyone left to defend trust and safety? According to an article in Platformer ([link removed] ) , it’s under assault from users, politicians, and their own executives—but the industry has responded with silence. (Free).

// 🤔 An article in MIT Technology Review ([link removed] ) highlighted research that found that forcing LLMs to be evil during training can make them nicer in the long run. (Paywall).

Partner news

// New podcast on empowering workers with equitable AI

Omidyar Network ([link removed] ) President Michele L. Jawando sat down with Nichol Bradford from the AI+HI Project to outline a people-first approach to AI development and deployment. Drawing on fresh case studies from Omidyar Network partners, Michele explains how transparent, worker-empowering tools can unlock “shared power, prosperity, and possibility.” Listen here ([link removed] ) .

// 5Rights seeks UK teens for EdTech youth board

Application Deadline: August 15

5Rights ([link removed] ) invites young people aged 13–17 across the UK to join their new EdTech Youth Advisory Board. Members will co-design research, share real-world classroom experiences, and influence national conversations on children’s rights in education. Apply here ([link removed] ) .

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// Project Liberty builds solutions that help people take back control of their lives in the digital age by reclaiming a voice, choice, and stake in a better internet.

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