Protect Your Privacy By Forwarding Your Emails Through a Decoy Account

One of the reasons our inboxes are full of spam is because our email addresses are all over the internet. Some of the organizations you share your email with aren’t quite so honest or careful, and either sell your data to spammers, or have it stolen in data leaks. The thing is, if these organizations never had your email address in the first place, there’d be nothing for spammers to buy or steal.

That’s why, instead of sharing your actual email address with others, you should share a decoy account that forwards your messages to your real address. These decoys can be the same every time, or can be totally random each instance you share your email: Either way, only the people you want to know your email address will, while every one else simply gets the decoy.

Of course, this doesn’t necessarily prevent spam from finding its way to your inbox: If you share the decoy with a spammer, or a company who has the decoy shares it with a spammer, that junk mail will still add up. However, you’ll know that junk mail is being sent to your decoy address, which can make it easier track down who is leaking your details across the web.

But even more than junk mail and spam, limiting who has your email address is a great way to protect your privacy. Whether it’s a personal or work email address, you don’t need to worry about bad actors attempting to use it to break into your accounts: Even if the decoy is leaked, if you use a separate decoy for every account, no one can use it to try to break into your other accounts.

As for how to use decoy accounts, there are multiple options. If you’re in the Apple ecosystem, Apple’s “Hide My Email” feature is a convenient option. However, DuckDuckGo also has a feature that will work across Mac and PC for free.