Apple will offer a new Hide My Email privacy feature with the upcoming iOS 15, iPadOS 15 and macOS Monterey software updates. Hide My Email was announced during the company's 2021 Worldwide Developers Conference, where Apple debuted a number of new software features and improvements to its operating systems, such as Focus for iOS 15 and the Reflect on Apple Watch.
The iOS Mail app comes pre-installed on iOS devices and allows the user to add a preferred email account, such as Gmail or Yahoo. Last year, the Mail app was subject to a security flaw, after it was found that hackers could potentially access a user’s account once they opened an email. Fortunately, Apple rolled out a patch for the issue soon after. Another new email-related feature announced during WWDC 2021 is Mail Privacy Protection, a solution designed to prevent senders from learning additional user information.
Hide My Email is intended for those who want a greater amount of control over who can see their personal email, according to Apple. The feature allows users to generate a random email address and this is what's visible to the sender instead of their real personal email. Hide My Email is part of iCloud+, a new subscription-based plan that's bundled with greater support for HomeKit security cameras and Apple's new Privacy Relay VPN-like feature. Due to this, any Apple users wanting to take advantage of Hide My Email will need to be signed up to one of the three iCloud+ plans, priced at $0.99, $2.99 and $9.99 per month.
How Apple's Hide My Email Works
Hide My Email forwards emails from a randomly generated address to another email account, so the user can still view emails from the sender. It also lets users generate and delete as many random addresses as they need. For those with an iCloud+ subscription, the option to use Hide My Email will be automatically included and available in the Mail app, as well as Safari and iCloud once the software updates roll out later in the year. The feature will also be fairly easy to use, with the user just needing to select the From field when sending an email and then tapping on the Hide My Email option to create the random address.
It would have been better if Hide My Email was made available for all users, but the peace of mind it provides is likely to be worth the cost to some users. Apple's Hide My Email not only protects people from inadvertently giving their email address to the wrong person, but rerouting unwanted emails in general is likely to remove many of the stresses related to providing an email address online.
Source: Apple