LEGAL MATTERS: Why Your Emails Are Never, Ever Private

Thursday, April 25, 2013

John T. Longo, GoLocalWorcester Legal Contributor

You might think some emails are private, but think again.

Should the Boston Marathon terrorists be able to keep their e-mails private? No.

Should you? Yes.

Can you? No.

E-mail is the most insecure way of communicating and people with good, and bad, intentions can easily intercept it. To understand why, you have to know a little about how e-mail works.

When you hit send, the e-mail you composed is broken down into packets of information and sent on their way through cyberspace. The packets are passed from computer server to computer server until they all reach the recipients e-mail account and are reassembled into a coherent e-mail message. The operator of every computer the packets pass through can open, read and store them without you ever knowing it. If you or the recipient keeps a copy of the e-mail on a computer, for instance if either of you are running Outlook, anyone who gets access to the computer’s hard drive can fish through the e-mail. Anyone with access to your e-mail account, or the recipient’s e-mail account, can also read the messages.

Crooks

Most crooks hack into e-mail accounts by stealing passwords. (That is how George Bush’s interest in painting was exposed – someone hacked into his relatives’ accounts then posted the e-mails he sent them.) But sophisticated criminal organizations can attack e-mail while it is in transit. They can set up their own servers to ‘sniff’ the good stuff in the packets that pass through them. If you are using an unsecured wireless network for e-mailing - like those hotels and stores often make available for free - your information can be sniffed even easier as it goes from your computer to the network. Using software that encrypts your e-mail, and only using secured wireless networks, are ways to partially protect your e-mails but neither is foolproof.

Employers

The Fourth Amendment protects you from unreasonably searches of your e-mail by only the government; it does not protect you from searches by anyone else. So if you are using a work e-mail address, or a work computer, your employer can root around in your e-mail all it wants. (A group of Harvard professors learned that the hard way.)

E-mail Service Providers

Using your personal computer and your personal e-mail address will not protect your information either. If you are using a free Gmail account, Google’s computers are already reading your e-mails and using the information to send you targeted advertisements. If you have sprung for a paid Gmail account, Google basically promises not to snoop unless, in its sole judgment, it decides to. They dress it up in some legalese, but the bottom line is they can read, and share, your e-mail without your permission and without telling you. So can Yahoo. Whether or not you should trust them is up to you; I’ll just point out that everyone trusted Enron and AIG.

Protect Yourself

If you have to use e-mail to send personal information - like your date of birth, Social Security number or passwords – use encryption software and consider breaking the information into a series of e-mails. Neither is a perfect solution but it will make it harder for the information to be stolen in transit.

For true protection, follow this advice from the non-digital age: Never put anything in writing you would not want published on the front page of the newspaper.

John Longo is a consumer rights attorney practicing law in Rhode Island and Massachusetts. He represents consumers who have disputes with businesses, employees cheated out of their wages or overtime, car buyers stuck with Lemons, and people in need of bankruptcy protection. He is a member of the National Association of Consumer Advocates, the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys, and the Rhode Island Association for Justice.