What is messenger-recall-tool?

Messenger Recall Tool is a Chrome browser extension that adds a side panel to Facebook Messenger, letting a person read, search, export, and bulk delete their own direct messages, including older messages that go beyond the 100 message limit that Messenger normally keeps cached locally. The author describes it as a personal research project meant only for use on your own account, not affiliated with Meta or Facebook. The extension works by reaching into Messenger's internal data rather than clicking through the normal chat interface. It captures the React component tree that Messenger's web app builds internally, reads the message database that Messenger stores in the browser, and decodes the underlying data format without an official schema, since Meta does not publish one. To bulk delete messages, it calls the same internal function Messenger's own recall button uses, but does so automatically across many messages with a random delay between each one to avoid triggering rate limits. Inside the side panel there are several tabs. A Load tab fetches older message history in pages. A View tab supports full text search and filtering by date, sender, or status, with the ability to select a range of messages at once. A Recall tab bulk deletes the selected messages. An Export tab saves the conversation as a PDF that looks like the original chat, complete with avatars and images, or as raw JSON data with statistics such as messages per hour or call durations. A Chat tab lets you send messages straight from the panel. An AI tab can auto reply to incoming messages using an OpenAI compatible API, with a configurable prompt and reply delay. Other features include viewing and downloading images sent in chats, including encrypted images the tool decrypts locally, and detecting missed or completed calls from the underlying data. To install it, a person clones the repository, opens Chrome's extensions page, turns on developer mode, and loads the folder as an unpacked extension, since it is not on the Chrome Web Store. The README is honest that this approach is unofficial: some message types are not yet decoded properly, recalling call related messages does not work because Facebook silently ignores those requests, and while the author has not been banned for using it, that is based on limited personal experience. The project is released under the MIT license and credits an earlier similar project as inspiration.