Kevin Mitnick's email security tips


Kevin Mitnick writing for Wired:

If you use Gmail, for example, a copy of every email sent and received through your Gmail account is retained on various servers worldwide at Google. This is also true if you use email systems provided by Yahoo, Apple, AT&T, Comcast, Microsoft, or even your workplace. Any emails you send can also be inspected, at any time, by the hosting company. Allegedly this is to filter out malware, but the reality is that third parties can and do access our emails for other, more sinister and self-serving, reasons.

While most of us may tolerate having our emails scanned for malware, and perhaps some of us tolerate scanning for advertising purposes, the idea of third parties reading our correspondence and acting on specific contents found within specific emails is downright disturbing.

The least you can do is make it much harder for them to do so.

You have to be pretty dedicated to jump through these hoops and also insist others do so on your behalf. It's an interesting read though to understand and your information can be tracked.