DuckDuckGo now offers anti-tracking email service to everyone

Expand / DuckDuckGo Email Protection, now in public beta, gives you an email address that will remove trackers from emails and forward the rest to you. DuckDuckGo

DuckDuckGo's tracker removal email service, which has been in private beta for a year, is now open to anyone using a DuckDuckGo mobile app, browser extension, or Mac browser . It also added some additional privacy tools.

The service provides you with a duck.com email address, intended to be given away for the type of "Sign up to our newsletter for 20% off" emails that you know exist only for collect data and target you for advertisements. Emails sent to your duck.com address are forwarded to the primary email address of your choosing, but with the trackers removed.

Email Protection now also fixes links, removes them from tracking modifiers, upgrades unencrypted HTTP URLs to HTTPS where possible, and, for the rare response needed, allows you to send directly from your email address. duck instead of exposing your primary email address. During its closed beta, DuckDuckGo claims that 85% of emails it processed contained hidden trackers.

To sign up for Email Protection, you must use the DuckDuckGo mobile app for iOS or Android, use the DuckDuckGo browser extension on Firefox, Chrome, Edge, or Brave, or use its Mac beta browser (the list for which must be attached in the DuckDuckGo mobile app).

In my experience, using the company's apps, extensions, or browser isn't necessary for the email forwarding service to work, but they do allow you to autofill your duck address and create more individual disposable email addresses, which is handy for filtering emails.

Enlarge / DuckDuckGo's email protection service removes trackers commonly embedded in commercial emails that return time opened, location, and device used, among other data. DuckDuckGo

DuckDuckGo notes that trackers hidden in images and links in emails may transmit information to the sender about when you opened a message, your geolocation when it was opened, and the device you were using. Knowing your primary email address can also allow companies to connect it to Facebook and Google and target you for advertising across all sites.

The company helpfully notes that it will not track you using its anti-tracking service. "When your duck addresses receive an email, we immediately apply our tracking protections and then forward it to you, without ever logging it on our systems. Sender information, subject lines...we we're not tracking any," the company wrote. on his blog post. DuckDuckGo is also "committed to long-term email protection" and states that it has worked through closed beta to support millions of users.

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