The Case for Email Confidentiality in Online Sign-Up Processes

Background: During our daily activities, we leave digital traces of our presence on various platforms that are protected by legal and compliance measures. However, have you ever considered the potential consequences if sensitive emails were to be leaked from these platforms as a result of a data breach? One significant challenge is that fraudsters can easily identify your business or personal email addresses without much difficulty.

Challenge: To protect ourselves from exposure through email metadata, we should consider using aliases to conceal our identity.

Resolutions: There are two ways to do this:

• As users, we can create separate email addresses for specific tasks.
• We can use the alias features provided by various email vendors.

For example, an alias allows you to transform your primary email, such as "[email protected]," into something like "[email protected]."

Real life example: Based on an official statement from nationalpublicdata.com, they experienced a data breach. As a result, a significant amount of data, including Social Security numbers, email addresses, and phone numbers, was leaked. This information can make it easier for fraudsters to target their victims based on the leaked email domain names.

Conclusion: Always use aliases if your email vendor provides that feature. By taking this precaution, you can ensure that, in the event of a data breach, it will be more difficult for fraudsters or hackers to identify the person behind the email.