Hiding an email account can be useful for many reasons. You may want to keep certain email addresses private from friends, family, or employers. Or you might use a secret account for online orders or subscriptions that could clutter your main inbox. Fortunately, with the right techniques, it’s possible to conceal an email address and keep your online activities separate.
Why Hide an Email Account?
There are a few main reasons people want to conceal an email account:
- Privacy – Keep personal email private from nosy family/friends/partners
- Work/life separation – Use one address for work and another for personal life
- Shopping/subscriptions – Avoid inbox clutter from online orders and mailing lists
- Anonymity – Remain anonymous for certain accounts/activities
- Compartmentalization – Separate different areas of life and responsibilities
For privacy, you may not want certain people seeing emails about health issues, counseling services, political affiliations, dating sites, or financial accounts. Keeping this correspondence private prevents uncomfortable questions.
For work/life balance, using separate accounts can help you avoid checking work email after hours or having personal messages distract you on the job. It also keeps client/customer emails from mingling with personal correspondences.
When shopping online and signing up for mailing lists, services, or subscriptions, a separate account prevents your primary inbox from getting overloaded. You can manage emails from retailers, deliveries, appointments, etc. in one place.
If you want to remain anonymous on forums, platforms, or other online activities, a secret account disconnected from your identity is helpful. This could be for whistleblowing, political activism, or other sensitive pursuits.
Compartmentalizing different areas of your life into individual accounts makes it easier to manage communication. You can use one address for family, another for work, a third for shopping, and so on. This separation of contexts can help you stay organized.
How to Hide an Email Account
There are several techniques you can use to conceal an email account:
- Use a alias or fake name when signing up
- Route emails to your main account
- Access it anonymously through Tor or VPNs
- Delete emails and clear history after reading
- Use cryptic account names
First, you can hide your real identity by using an alias or fake name when registering the account. Avoid any identifying details in the account credentials. Also, don’t link it to existing social media or other profiles that could reveal who you are.
Second, you can have all emails from your secret account forwarded or redirected to your main email inbox. This allows you to check messages without logging into the covert account. On Gmail, use the account settings to enable forwarding. On Outlook and Yahoo Mail, use rules to reroute the messages.
Third, you can hide your IP address and physical location using anonymity software like Tor or VPNs. By connecting through intermediate servers and encryption, your activity on the account will be untraceable back to your computer or device.
Fourth, vigilantly delete any messages and clear browser history after reading emails from the account. That way there’s no record in your inbox or cache if someone else accesses your device. Use the delete message button rather than just archiving.
Fifth, when creating the account, use a cryptic or nonsensical name that people can’t easily associate with you. Random strings of numbers and letters work well. Avoid birthdays, nicknames, pets names, or dates.
How to Keep the Email Account Secret
Once you’ve created a hidden email account, you’ll also need to take measures to keep it private:
- Don’t link it to existing social media profiles
- Create unique passwords using a password manager
- Enable two-factor authentication for logins
- Don’t reuse answers for security questions
- Don’t allow password recovery via phone number or alternate email
- Clear browser history after each use
First, avoid connecting your covert email to existing social networks like Facebook or LinkedIn that could reveal your real identity. These could also recommend contacts and expose the account.
Second, create long, complex passwords using a password manager. Enable two-factor authentication via an authenticator app for additional login security. SMS and phone recovery often expose accounts.
Third, give fictional answers to security questions that only you know. Reused answers from your Amazon profile or first pet’s name make accounts easy to hack.
Fourth, don’t allow password recovery via SMS or alternate emails that could compromise anonymity. Only use reset through a new code sent to the covert email itself.
Finally, clear all history, cookies and cache from the web browser after accessing the account. Don’t stay permanently logged in. Public, shared, or family devices used to check the email present privacy risks.
Email Providers That Offer Anonymity
Some email providers cater specifically to users who want anonymous and private accounts disconnected from their identity:
Provider | Key Features |
---|---|
ProtonMail | End-to-end encryption, open source codebase, based in Switzerland |
Tutanota | Encrypted inbox, can use without providing phone/name, based in Germany |
DuckDuckGo Email | Private email @duck.com, protected by DuckDuckGo privacy features |
ProtonMail, based in Switzerland, provides end-to-end encryption and open source code for their security-focused email service. Messages are encrypted so even ProtonMail can’t read your emails.
Tutanota, based in Germany, also uses end-to-end encryption with no ability for Tutanota to decrypt messages. You can create accounts easily with just a username and password.
DuckDuckGo Email offers private email at @duck.com protected by DuckDuckGo’s privacy features like tracker blocking and encryption. It aims to keep no user logs or personal data.
For maximum anonymity, use these secure email providers over mainstream options like Gmail and Outlook. Read their privacy policies to understand what data they collect and how messages are protected.
Risks of Hidden Email Accounts
While hiding an email account can provide privacy benefits, there are also some risks to consider:
- Account could be permanently inaccessible if credentials are lost
- Messages could be lost if provider shuts down
- Hacking the account compromises all anonymity
- Using for illegal/illicit activities has risks
- Lack of password recovery and closure options if hacked
Because you likely cannot perform password recovery via phone/email on a hidden account, losing the password means losing account access permanently. There’s also no way to retrieve old messages.
If the email provider goes out of business, you could lose access to all communications with no option to export archives. Many anonymous providers can simply shut down overnight.
Hackers compromising a covert account’s password completely negates anonymity since they can then access all messages and account details. Recovering a hacked hidden account is difficult.
Any potential illegal activities conducted with the email address means stored messages become evidence. The lack of account recovery also means you may not be able to delete the data.
Overall, while hidden accounts provide privacy, the lack of backup options for passwords and recovery introduces risks. You must keep credentials very safe and ensure the provider is reliable.
Ethics of Hidden Email Accounts
There are some ethical considerations when using concealed email accounts:
- In relationships, they can enable secret communication and deception
- At work, they may violate IT policies on corporate accounts
- Governments argue anonymity protects criminal activity
In marriages and relationships, hidden accounts are sometimes used to secretly communicate with other partners, facilitating affairs and cheating.
For jobs with corporate email policies, concealed accounts could enable employees to conduct business communications without oversight.
Governments argue anonymous accounts can protect criminal activities like drug trafficking and distribution of child abuse images. However, anonymity is also vital for protecting political speech.
There are certainly ethical ways to use secondary accounts, like accessing health services or protecting political activities in oppressive regimes. But the ability to deceive also carries risks without oversight.
Conclusion
Keeping an email account hidden from certain individuals or groups can provide privacy benefits in the right contexts. By using an alias, routing emails to your primary inbox, encrypting messages, and deleting history, you can conceal an address.
However, loss of access and lack of recovery options introduce risks. There are also ethical considerations around relationships, corporate IT policies, and potential criminal uses. Ultimately, hidden accounts are tools – their secrecy can be used ethically or unethically depending on the situation.