DuckDuckGo Announces Cross Platform Alternative to Apple's Hide My Email

DuckDuckGo today announced its brand new Email Protection feature that will allow users to save themselves from being tracked by trackers embedded into emails by forwarding them to a free and personalized DuckDuckGo email before being sent to their actual email.

duck duck go email protection
DuckDuckGo's Email Protection comes as an alternative to Apple's Hide My Email part of iCloud+, allowing users to direct emails for apps, websites, and services to a random ‌‌iCloud‌‌ email address before being sent to their actual address. This process means that apps and services never directly see a user's actual email, only their random ‌‌iCloud‌‌ address.

Apple has also introduced a similar feature as part of iOS 15 and macOS Monterey that hides a user's IP address and loads all content within an email, including "hidden pixels" for tracking in the background, through proxy servers. DuckDuckGo says its feature differs since it just removes trackers from an email before it's sent to a user, compared to Apple's approach which it claims sends "erroneous" user data back to a tracker's servers.

One of the largest cornerstones of DuckDuckGo's offering, compared to Apple's Hide My Email, is its cross-platform compatibility. Apple's Hide My Email will only work on Apple devices. At the same time, thanks to DuckDuckGo's browser extension and apps available on other platforms, DuckDuckGo's Email Protection is available no matter where a user chooses to browse the internet.

Choose your Duck Email Address (you@duck.com) and start giving it out. We remove hidden trackers from incoming emails sent to this address, then forward them to your regular inbox for safer reading. This means if you use an email service like Gmail or Yahoo, it’s no problem! Emails sent to your Personal Duck Address will arrive there as usual so you can read your email like normal, in any app or on the web, worry-free.

DuckDuckGo is pledging that it never saves a user's email and that even when emails are sent to its servers to be cleansed from trackers, that information remains private. DuckDuckGo is offering the new feature to a private group of beta testers, and those interested can join the waitlist.

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Top Rated Comments

sniffies Avatar
52 months ago
I'm more bothered by the amount of spam calls I get on my phone number.

No existing laws, no fines on telcos, no third-party apps have alleviated the problem. It's only getting worse and worse every year.

How come we can land a rover on Mars but we can't stop spam calls???
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Sciomar Avatar
52 months ago
This is great news, the more privacy focused companies the better.
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
rictus007 Avatar
52 months ago
Next step would be to have the same thing for the phone number
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
One2Grift Avatar
52 months ago

This is great news, the more privacy focused companies the better.
Exactly right! Apple, now DDG ----- keep it going.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
ddtmm Avatar
52 months ago
This is awesome. I'm glad to see more companies onboard with privacy protection. We need more of this. Maybe Apple will open up their iCloud+ email to work outside Apple's hardware as well, though not holding my breath. I'm definitely signing on to this one.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
LeadingHeat Avatar
52 months ago

DuckDuckGo says its feature differs since it just removes trackers from an email before it's sent to a user, compared to Apple's approach which it claims sends "erroneous" user data back to a tracker's servers.
I think I’d rather have the false (erroneous?) data sent back than nothing at all. That way they know it was blocked. Similar to the downfalls of PiHole sadly.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)