Why Does Yahoo & AOL Want To Read Your Emails?

Oath, the umbrella company which owns and controls both AOL and Yahoo, declared this month that it updated its privacy policies which, in effect, grants and allows the company to scan its users’ AOL and Yahoo email inboxes. This has been done to show the tailored ads or targeted advertising to the users of two giant legacy Internet brands. Oath is further owned by Verizon.

Oath has confirmed that a single unified privacy policy for its users of AOL and Yahoo is rolled out. This change was first spotted by Jason Kint of Digital Content Next.

Few excerpts from the updated privacy policy read:

The policy statement further reads, “the company can analyze your content and other information (including emails, instant messages, posts photos, attachments, and other communications).” Users’ banking and financial transaction emails will also be scanned by the ad targeting engine of Oath. And this data might be shared with parent company Verizon, too.

After repeated requests for any further clarification on the new privacy policy, Oath’s spokesperson replied only with this statement:

The privacy policy of Yahoo, when it was not a subsidiary of Verizon, included these same terms. But AOL’s did not. AOL users can find more information and ask for help from AOL customer service number. Users can choose to opt out of targeted ads and there are options to manage your marketing preferences as well. If you want to disable the targeted ads, login to your Yahoo account and visit Ad Interest Manager. With your AOL account, sign in and choose to opt out of interest-based advertising.

This is not the first time when an email service provider changed its privacy policy to scan users’ emails and show them ads more efficiently. Gmail also started doing this but due to controversy it ended the practice last year. According to experts, Verizon has acquired Yahoo with these same intentions which are now being implemented. The acquisition was always about online advertising, $200 billion industry.

This tendency of companies to either track their users’ online activity or read their online communication is nothing new in 2018. In a post-Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica world, users must always remain alert regarding their privacy and security in the online world.