Here’s something to think about next time you check your email: chances are, at least some of your messages are being tracked. This technology is being used by businesses and acquaintances to quietly watch your email habits. This sounds terrifying but there are some things you can do to protect yourself.

What is email tracking?

There are some 269 billion emails sent and received daily. That’s roughly 35 emails for every person on the planet, every day. Over 40 percent of those emails are tracked.

Email tracking is a basic but effective tool of surveillance that has taken over most inboxes. It typically employs a tiny pixel image attached to your email that is invisible to you, but once you open the email, the image is loaded from a server and the server records that data for the tracking agency. 

These trackers vary in precision. Some are similar to read receipts that inform you when and how often an email is read, while others track clicks and downloads or let a sender know when, where and on what device an email was opened.

Why do people use trackers?

Email trackers are widely used by marketers, newsletter writers and sales organizations. The big tech companies, however, are the biggest offenders these days. They want to understand their audience and what they’re most interested in. More obviously, they want to know the sort of return they can get from advertising dollars.

How do we find out what’s being tracked?

You might not be able to do much about the use of these tracking pixels, but you can take steps to stop them from functioning.  For Google based email accounts (Gmail accounts) use “Ugly Email” and “Pixel Block“. This software will detect email trackers automatically and block them. For Outlook accounts use “Thunderbird“. 

If you’re still not feeling safe, here are some additional steps that you can take:

• Add another layer of protection by changing the settings within your email server, and on your android/apple devices. Disable the autoloading of images in emails, which would include any invisible tracking pixels.
• Regularly clean up your promo emails. If you’re not interested in them, unsubscribe. If you sign up for a newsletter, even from a trusted source, there’s a one in three chance that the email that newsletter service sends you will be loaded with a tracking image hosted on an outside server. THis means your email address can then be shared with a “large network of third parties.”
• Change your social media privacy settings. When Facebook sends you an email notifying you about new activity on your account and you open it, Facebook knows where you are, the device you’re using and the last picture you’ve taken. Go into your account settings and change your privacy ( sometimes called “permission” instead). Change your tracking settings on your device itself to block tracking apps.
• Minimize hackers by not opening anything that seems odd, like emails from names you don’t know, or emails with suspicious subject lines.
• Do an antivirus sweep once a month with a software like Avast or Malwarebytes.