Which email providers use your data for targeted ads, from Gmail to Outlook

The world’s leading email providers top the list of the worst firms in the sector for protecting the public’s privacy, with users’ sensitive search histories and location data potentially being shared.

People should avoid using Gmail and Microsoft Outlook – the two top offenders for digital privacy – according to research group Ethical Consumer, which rated 13 email providers.

Apple, Yahoo Mail and AOL made up the top five that performed poorly for digital privacy.

Ethical Consumer recommended that people use privacy-focused email providers, such as GreenNet, Posteo and Runbox, which also all run on renewable energy.

The research shows that despite growing concern about online privacy, Outlook and Gmail continue to share with advertising networks data of certain user activity across their platforms.

Email providers have generally stopped directly scanning email content, but the larger ones still collect extensive data on users, says Ethical Consumer. This can include search history, location data, device information and interactions with their other platforms.

This could result in email users receiving, without having requesting them, adverts associated with topics they may have been discussing on email.

The collected data tends to be anonymised, but Ethical Consumer pointed out that individuals might still be at risk of being targeted, which could lead to fraudulent and exploitative practices, including scams.

Ruth Strange, who led the research for the group, said: “If you want to replace an existing email account, the good news is there are secure and ethical email providers available. Many of the ethical providers have easy ways for you to change over to a new account, including contacts and old messages.

“It is important for users to look beyond the marketing and question what’s really happening with your data.”

The report highlighted Gmail and Microsoft Outlook as email providers to avoid, with broad data sharing standard practice at both companies. Data on user activity across their services is regularly shared with advertising networks and brokers for targeted marketing.

Gmail and Microsoft Outlook together account for two thirds of email providers’ global market share.

Apple advertises that its iMessages service offers end-to-end encryption, which ensures only those people communicating with each other can access the messages. However emails automatically move to its iCloud storage for customers, which can be accessed by law enforcement agencies via a warrant or, potentially, by hackers. iCloud accounts for 55.4 per cent of email providers’ global market share.

How the ratings work

From keeping your emails private and passwords safe, to how email companies treat their staff and what adverts show up for you online, the report from Ethical Consumer rated 13 email providers.

The five metrics were climate, workers, tax conduct, company ethos and digital privacy.

Ethical Consumer used a rating system on digital privacy to rate each company out of 100. Higher scores were awarded to those that provided end-to-end encryption for email accounts at their most basic pricing tier.

Marks were deducted from other providers due to criticisms around digital privacy across their services.

Neither Gmail or Outlook offers end-to-end encryption as standard, and both generate increasing emissions due to the intense energy usage of developing AI models.

Both firms also scored zero across four out of the five categories they were rated.

The fifth category was climate, for which Microsoft Outlook received zero from the top score of 100, while Gmail received 10. 

Google was highlighted in the report due to its efforts to disrupt European privacy laws, particularly the ePrivacy Regulation, which aims to work alongside General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) rules to protect internet users’ data.

Documents and leaked meeting records in 2022 were alleged to have exposed the company’s strategy of undermining online privacy. This includes pushing for loopholes that would allow Gmail users to continue to track users across websites without consent. This type of information could, again, be used to provide data that allows advertisers to target email users.

Earlier this month Microsoft and Google collaborated to improve privacy in Chrome’s Incognito mode on Windows 10 and 11. The update prevents clipboard content, copied during private browsing sessions, from being saved in Windows’ clipboard history or synced via Cloud Clipboard.

Google claims no data collected from scanning emails is used for advertising, but Ethical Consumer claims it continues to scan and record this information, even though it is no longer used for advertising.

Google’s privacy policy states: “When you use our services, you’re trusting us with your information. We understand this is a big responsibility and work hard to protect your information and put you in control.”

On its website Apple claims: “Privacy is a fundamental human right. It’s also one of our core values. Which is why we design our products and services to protect it. That’s the kind of innovation we believe in.”

Microsoft claims: “We ground our privacy commitments in strong data governance practices, so you can trust that we’ll protect the privacy and confidentiality of your data and will only use it in a way that’s consistent with the reasons you provided it.”

Google, Microsoft and Apple did not respond to requests for comment.