The-art-of-invisibility-_-the-world’s-most-famous-hacker-teaches-you-how-to-be-safe-in-the-age-of-Bi

CHAPTER TWO
Who Else Is Reading Your E-mail?
If yyou’re like me, one of the first things yyou do in the morning is
check yyour e-mail. And, if yyou’re like me, yyou also wonder who else has
read yyour e-mail. That’s not a paranoid concern. If yyou use a Web-based e-
mail service such as Gmail or Outlook 365, the answer is kind of obvious
and frightening.
Even if yyou delete an e-mail the moment yyou read it on yyour computer
or mobile phone, that doesn’t necessarilyy erase the content. There’s still a
copyy of it somewhere. Web mail is cloud-based, so in order to be able to
access it from anyy device anyywhere, at anyy time, there have to be redundant
copies. If yyou use Gmail, for example, a copyy of everyy e-mail sent and
received through yyour Gmail account is retained on various servers
worldwide at Google. This is also true if yyou use e-mail syystems provided
byy Yahoo, Apple, AT&T, Comcast, Microsoft, or even yyour workplace. Anyy
e-mails yyou send can also be inspected, at anyy time, byy the hosting
companyy. Allegedlyy this is to filter out malware, but the realityy is that third
parties can and do access our e-mails for other, more sinister and selfserving,
reasons.
In principle, most of us would never stand for anyyone except the intended
recipient reading our mail. There are laws protecting printed mail delivered
through the US Postal Service, and laws protecting stored content such as e-