WHAT YOU CAN DO
• Stop Google and Microsoft spying on your email usage
• Encrypt messages so only the recipients can read them
• Block all spam and stop safe senders being blocked
• Automatically remove hidden trackers from emails
• Access Gmail and Outlook through an alternative inbox
• Set your private emails to expire after a specific time
• Keep using Google tools without a Gmail address
Gmail and Outlook may be the most popular webmail services, but as with Chrome and Edge – two other Google and Microsoft tools – that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re the best. They’re certainly far from the most private and secure, not only because their parent companies are notorious for collecting users’ data, but also because their high-profile nature makes their accounts prime targets for hackers. For example, back in August, Google reported that an Iranian cyber-warfare group was specifically stealing data from Gmail and Outlook users (tinyurl.com/APC516iran).
Having an account with one of these two services is undoubtedly convenient, especially for syncing your details, content and preferences across multiple Google and Microsoft devices, but – as we explain in this feature – other email providers offer stronger protection against snoopers, scammers and spammers.
Here we recommend the best alternative webmail services to Gmail and Outlook – all of which are more private, offer most of the same features and receive less junk mail. If ditching your current email address seems like too much trouble, we also suggest the best ways to send and receive messages without using Google and Microsoft’s websites and apps.
As all the services we’ve included here are free (though some offer paid-for upgrades), you can use one as your secondary email account until you’re ready to switch from Gmail or Outlook.
WHY YOU SHOULD STOP USING GMAIL & OUTLOOK
Gmail and Outlook collect your personal data
Google no longer reads the content of your emails so it can target you with ads – a controversial practice it stopped in 2017 – but it still monitors your Gmail account and collects data about how you use the service. This includes details of when you send messages, who you send them to and where you send them from. It also checks the content of incoming messages to determine their importance and sort them into categories such as Promotions and Social, and – more invasively – logs your purchases, delivery tracking numbers and travel bookings.
Your Gmail emails are scanned using AI algorithms rather than by humans, which allows the service to detect and block spam, phishing scams and malware, but this compromises your privacy by automatically linking information in messages with your Google account. This is especially true if you’ve enabled Gmail’s ‘smart’ features such
