Really happy that Apple introduced Hide My Email for this reason. Only wish it was easier to manage cross platform and for the ability to initiate email convos instead of only replying.
I would suggest people use email canaries which are simply email aliases that map to ones email account. If a site refuses to accept that email address that is a red flag to stay far away from that business.
My suggestion may appear redundant as they do mention in the article to create many email addresses but those email address examples they give are bad. If for example your email is related to Netflix, do not put netflix in the email address. That is a dead give-away that you are using a canary. Companies are wising up to this. Instead add a comment in the email alias notes if using a paid provider such as Fastmail or in the mapping file as a comment if self hosting email.
It can be. In fact even if a person uses a whois-privacy service for their domain there is almost always a unique identifier for that persons registrar account and that can also be used for tracking.
Sites such as fastmail allow adding aliases using one of their several domains with the one downside it is harder to find a short unique name. I have one encoded into my profile here on HN.
Can you recommend a service that makes it easy to create email canaries? Or should I just create two dozen gmail addresses and cycle through them? Also, if I do create two dozen gmail addresses, won't Google just figure this out because of the forwarding rules and keep me under surveillance anyway?
Can you recommend a service that makes it easy to create email canaries?
Fastmail is a commonly used provider for this but you can probably find others that also allow email aliases. Each provider usually has a limit of aliases per account.
won't Google just figure this out
Google will see your IP address and Google tracking cookies in Gmail to know it is you. I can't even guess what Google does with that use case these days.
Fastmail allows the creation of lots of aliases which can be useful if you think your email address might be abused after signup. I guess you could use plus addresses as well since gmail supports them but they can be ignored.
Have a "spam-only" email account that is only given out to those people you don't want to give your real email address to.
For example, your real email address might be 'billsmith@gmail.com', and your "spam email" account might be 'billybloggs@yahoo.com'. Now you know for sure, that any emails that go to the 'billybloggs@yahoo.com' are more than likely to be just good old spam (aka 'advertising').
Just like any other spam folder, you might have a quick scan of what's arrived roughly once a month or so, if you feel like it. And while you're at it, you can bulk-delete them all, getting the bucket ready for the next month's crap.
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[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 36.9 ms ] threadAnd my own two cents based on my experience:
I would suggest people use email canaries which are simply email aliases that map to ones email account. If a site refuses to accept that email address that is a red flag to stay far away from that business.
My suggestion may appear redundant as they do mention in the article to create many email addresses but those email address examples they give are bad. If for example your email is related to Netflix, do not put netflix in the email address. That is a dead give-away that you are using a canary. Companies are wising up to this. Instead add a comment in the email alias notes if using a paid provider such as Fastmail or in the mapping file as a comment if self hosting email.
[1] - https://archive.ph/c8Oef
Sites such as fastmail allow adding aliases using one of their several domains with the one downside it is harder to find a short unique name. I have one encoded into my profile here on HN.
Fastmail is a commonly used provider for this but you can probably find others that also allow email aliases. Each provider usually has a limit of aliases per account.
won't Google just figure this out
Google will see your IP address and Google tracking cookies in Gmail to know it is you. I can't even guess what Google does with that use case these days.
For example, your real email address might be 'billsmith@gmail.com', and your "spam email" account might be 'billybloggs@yahoo.com'. Now you know for sure, that any emails that go to the 'billybloggs@yahoo.com' are more than likely to be just good old spam (aka 'advertising').
Just like any other spam folder, you might have a quick scan of what's arrived roughly once a month or so, if you feel like it. And while you're at it, you can bulk-delete them all, getting the bucket ready for the next month's crap.