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.

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.