The estimated reading time for this post is 4 minutes
This week The Wall Street Journal reported on app developers having access to people’s email accounts and how these developers were using this access to read emails. While developers reportedly removed identifying information before emails were read, the realization that developers were accessing others’ emails was unwelcome news to many.
See, The Wall Street Journal Tech’s ‘Dirty Secret’: The App Developers Sifting Through Your Gmail.
Why App Developers Have Access to Email
App developers gain access to your emails when you use an app with your email service and you give that developer permission to access your email account. Some examples of apps that work with emails are Unroll.me, Slice, Boomerang and HubSpot.
Learn more about these apps at:
- Unroll.me – Get Control of Your Inbox!
- Slice — Your Personal Shopping Assistant!
- Boomerang – Put Off Today’s Gmail Until Later
None of those developers were mentioned in The Wall Street Journal article. The article specifically covered developers Return Path and Edison and stated, “There is no indication that Return Path, Edison or other developers of Gmail add-ons have misused data in that fashion.”
These apps perform tasks such as organizing email messages, tracking shipping of purchases, scheduling email messages to be sent later and giving the sender information about when an email is opened. These services can be useful to help manage email better and The Wonder of Tech has reviewed many of these services.
For these apps to work, they need to have access to emails. For example, with Slice, emails are reviewed to determine whether they are confirmation of an online purchase so shipping of the package can be tracked.
When a user signs up for these apps, permission must be given for the app to have access to emails. Otherwise the apps can’t perform their functions.
The Wall Street Journal report found that some of the app developers reviewed emails to determine whether the emails were being analyzed correctly in order to for the apps to perform the necessary tasks.
How to See Which Apps Have Access to Your Email Account
By taking a few minutes to review your email permissions, you can see which apps have access to your account. If the app is no longer useful to you, then you should revoke your permission for the app to access your email. You should consider your need for email privacy versus the usefulness of the apps.
As we learned with Facebook, restricting permission for apps limits access to your information and reduces the potential that developers may use information in ways that were unanticipated.
Learn more at => How to Find the Data You’ve Shared on Facebook and Protect It in the Future
The Wall Street Journal focused on Gmail accounts, stating that “Nearly two-thirds of all active email users globally have a Gmail account, according to comScore, and Gmail has more users than the next 25 largest email providers combined.”
The article also mentioned that app developers also have access to email accounts the next two largest email providers, Microsoft and Verizon, the owner of Yahoo and AOL email services.
Gmail
To review which apps have access to your Gmail account, head to the Google My Account page and start a Security Checkup by clicking Get Started.
On the next screen, click Third-party access to review which apps have permission to access your Gmail account.
Click Remove Access to revoke permission to any apps you aren’t using.
Click on the i next to each app to learn more about the permission you’ve given to the app.
Note => while you’re doing a security checkup, be sure to add Two-Step Verification if you haven’t already done so, to increase the security of your account. See, How to Use 2-Step Verification for an Extra Layer of Password Protection.
Review which apps have access to your email accounts. If you don’t recognize an app, or if an app is no longer useful to you, be sure to revoke access. You can always grant it again later if you find you need it.
Other Email Accounts
If you use an email provider other than Gmail, you should still check app permissions for your account.
For Microsoft, go to Microsoft Apps Permissions Page
For Yahoo go to Yahoo Help Remove Permissions page.
For AOL go to the AOL Help Page — Find And Remove Unusual Activity from Your Account page.
For other email providers, search for “remove app permissions” and the name of the email provider to find the web page where you can review app permissions for your email account.
Your Thoughts
Do you use third-party apps with your email account? Are you concerned about developers having access to your email messages? Have you checked to see which apps have permission to access your email account?
Share your thoughts in the Comments section below!
*Email image (edited) courtesy of Blogtrepreneur via Flickr and Creative Commons
Hi,
It’s usual that we everybody use some third-party apps with our email account, I also one of them. But, never think about that seriously.
After, reading the above discussion, now I’m really feeling vulnerable about the privacy. It’s time to review which apps have access to my email accounts to make secure the privacy as much as possible.
Thanks a lot for sharing this significant information.
Hi Ashraful, You’re very wise to check which apps have access to your emails. If you’re not using them any more, or they are no longer useful to you, then definitely revoke permissions from the app.
We should pay more attention to privacy and not give our email access to apps that aren’t working well for us.