Third-Party Applications Can Read All Your Emails On Gmail
The start of 2018 was a privacy nightmare for companies such as Facebook. In March it was discovered that Facebook harvested the data of more than 50 million people, and in May Facebook admitted to recording call and text message logs. Less than a week ago, it was discovered that Facebook filed a patent that would enable Facebook to enable a device’s microphone via sound waves and record “background noise.”
Now it has come to light that a selection of app developers have almost full access to some people’s emails. There are currently 1.4 billion users of Gmail, and people are able to connect to third-party applications such as email management tools, calendars, and travel price comparisons.
When people link these applications to their accounts, they are prompted with permissions that the application requires. Some of these requirements include the ability to “read, send, delete and manage your email.” According to some sources, these permissions may give actual people access to your emails. Some companies have even stated that employees have read thousands of emails.
Edison Software revealed that they had reviewed emails from hundreds of users to add new features to their software. Another company, eDataSource Inc, said that their engineers reviewed emails to improve their algorithms. These companies said that they didn’t ask users for their permission; as it was all covered in the user agreements – something that barely anyone will ever read.
Professor Alan Woodward from the University of Surrey said;
“You can spend weeks of your life reading terms and conditions. It might well be mentioned in there, but it’s not what you would think of as reasonable, for a human being in a third-party company to be able to read your emails.”
Google has responded and said that only companies that have been vetted are allowed access to your emails, and are only allowed access to these if the user had “explicitly granted permission to access email.“
