The "Protect Mail activity" option won’t be enabled by default — but don’t get your hopes up.
Posted: Sat Dec 07, 2024 9:29 am
In recent months, news of the iOS 15 update has caused quite a stir in the email marketing community. The reason? Apple is introducing ‘Mail Privacy Protection’, a feature that “stops senders from using invisible pixels to collect information about the user”.
Once enabled, email marketing services will no longer be able to track open rates for Apple Mail users.
With open rate being one of the most widely used email marketing metrics, marketers will need to adjust their strategies.
How Does Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection Work?
The first thing to know is that Mail Privacy Protection isn’t mandatory. That said, the option will be presented to all users.
When iOS 15 users open their Apple Mail app, they’ll be greeted bahrain telephone number data by this message:
Our recent Brevo consumer survey showed that 68% of consumers are more concerned with online privacy now than pre-pandemic and 65% trust third-party applications less than a year ago.
Going by these figures, it’s highly likely that people will opt for this additional layer of data protection.
Once enabled, Apple acts as a go-between, downloading the email content as well any tracking pixels onto a proxy-server before serving it to the email recipient (to learn more about the technical side, Litmus explains it here).
Ok, so what’s the big deal, you’re wondering. Well here’s the thing: All emails sent to Apple Mail users will be automatically counted as open. You’ll no longer be able to tell which users opened your emails, and which didn’t.
Here’s what Apple had to say in its official press release:
“In the Mail app, Mail Privacy Protection stops senders from using invisible pixels to collect information about the user. The new feature helps users prevent senders from knowing when they open an email, and masks their IP address so it can’t be linked to other online activity or used to determine their location.”
As well as not being able to measure opens, it’ll also be impossible to track things like geographical location.
Mail Privacy Protection obviously has its advantages for the end user. In recent years, especially since the introduction of the GDPR, consumer data protection is being taken a lot more seriously. And this is a good thing for everyone.
Once enabled, email marketing services will no longer be able to track open rates for Apple Mail users.
With open rate being one of the most widely used email marketing metrics, marketers will need to adjust their strategies.
How Does Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection Work?
The first thing to know is that Mail Privacy Protection isn’t mandatory. That said, the option will be presented to all users.
When iOS 15 users open their Apple Mail app, they’ll be greeted bahrain telephone number data by this message:
Our recent Brevo consumer survey showed that 68% of consumers are more concerned with online privacy now than pre-pandemic and 65% trust third-party applications less than a year ago.
Going by these figures, it’s highly likely that people will opt for this additional layer of data protection.
Once enabled, Apple acts as a go-between, downloading the email content as well any tracking pixels onto a proxy-server before serving it to the email recipient (to learn more about the technical side, Litmus explains it here).
Ok, so what’s the big deal, you’re wondering. Well here’s the thing: All emails sent to Apple Mail users will be automatically counted as open. You’ll no longer be able to tell which users opened your emails, and which didn’t.
Here’s what Apple had to say in its official press release:
“In the Mail app, Mail Privacy Protection stops senders from using invisible pixels to collect information about the user. The new feature helps users prevent senders from knowing when they open an email, and masks their IP address so it can’t be linked to other online activity or used to determine their location.”
As well as not being able to measure opens, it’ll also be impossible to track things like geographical location.
Mail Privacy Protection obviously has its advantages for the end user. In recent years, especially since the introduction of the GDPR, consumer data protection is being taken a lot more seriously. And this is a good thing for everyone.