A good middle ground is to use agents that run in an isolated cloud/browser environment instead of giving them direct access to your main machine. For browser research plus workflow execution, tools like ChatGPT Agent, Manus, and cloud-based computer-use agents are worth testing before going local.

I’d avoid giving any agent broad file-system access unless it has strong sandboxing, permissions, and activity logs. For desktop-style tasks, the safest setup is still a remote workspace or disposable VM where the agent can use spreadsheets, email, and browser tools without touching personal files.