Proposal: add chrome.dom.createDomImageBitmap: better+secure access to dom images

[Gregory Huczynski]

Hi Devlin, Simeon and extension-api-reviews@chromium,

I’m Greg - a non-Google/non-Chromium software engineer who is bootstrapping a browser extension to launch.

I’m submitting a proposal for a single-function addition to the chrome.dom API that should benefit the MV3 transition for users, developers and browser manufacturers.

Simeon pointed me at the New Extension and Platform App APIs doc, so I’m roughly following the guidelines in submitting a Chromium issue, and alerting the relevant parties by email. I’ve also put the 30 second summary below.

Chromium issue: https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=1341943

30 Second summary

What: Add a new createDomImageBitmap function to the chrome.dom extensions API - a tweaked version of the standard createImageBitmap function that can access any loaded dom image without SecurityErrors.

Why: Let chrome extensions offer popular image extraction and manipulation features post MV3 transition, without needing broad and insecure host_permissions of "http://*/*" and "https://*/*". So maintain/enable user-valued features with a reduced browser attack surface.

Demo video (51 seconds): https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pu6DQyr5ASoOzxUFMivcWMxrKA7_7K5A/view

Many thanks for your consideration.

Greg