A handful of third-party email clients have been found to be scraping their users’ inboxes for profit. A new report by Motherboard reveals that apps such as Edison Email, a popular and free cross-platform email service with millions of downloads, have been selling anonymized data and analytics they acquired from users’ accounts to corporate giants in the finance, travel, and e-commerce sectors.
By scanning people’s inboxes, these email platforms have been essentially able to stitch consumer metrics such as brand loyalty and purchase habits. Companies then process this information likely for their marketing campaigns, as well as future product development. The documents obtained by Motherboard also include two more major email apps: CleanFox and Japan-based conglomerate, Rakuten’s Slice.
Email companies primarily gain access and rights to actively scan users’ inboxes through “personalized” features. These tools go through all the emails a person receives and format them in a more readable layout. For instance, Edison has a package-tracking section where it sorts all the updates from courier companies like Amazon and FedEx.
While most of the companies promote “privacy-first” principles on their websites, fine prints of their policies clearly mention these practices and say their users have an option to opt out of personalized features. “You can opt out of having your Commercial Data used in Trends at any time and continue to use the Edison Services with no degradation to your experience,” Edison states in its Privacy Policy.
“To keep our Edison Mail app free, and to protect your privacy by rejecting an advertising-based business model, our company Edison Software measures e-commerce through a technology that automatically recognizes commercial emails and extracts anonymous purchase information from them. Our technology is designed to ignore personal and work email, which does not help us measure market trends,” wrote Edison in a blog post moments after Motherboard’s investigation was published.
Regardless, you should steer clear of third-party email apps such as Edison and CleanFox. These services pretty much take over your inbox in the registration process and at all times, their employees have the right to read and modify your emails. In 2018, a Wall Street Journal report revealed that third-party email companies including Edison had employees read the emails of hundreds of users to craft personalized features.
If you do wish to quit a third-party email app you have been using, the most efficient way is to head over to your email provider’s settings page and revoke the service’s access. On Gmail, you can find these options under Security > Manage Third-Party Access.
Are you tired of paying for streaming services you never watch just to get a phone plan feature you actually want? T-Mobile has good news for you! The carrier is rolling out new plans, called T-Mix, in early November to replace its old Experience lineup with a build-your-own perks system called Picks.
The benefits you choose vary from streaming and gaming to food delivery, AI, satellite service, and phone discounts. But if you are satisfied with your existing plan, you can keep it.
Merely days after the iPhone Duo hit the shelves, images of broken screens on the phone started popping up across social media. Until now, it’s been unclear what’s causing the line of defective pixels that appears vertically along the crease, as well as horizontally, on the phone’s inner display.
Apple has finally acknowledged the issue, which has shown up on iPhone Duo units owned by customers as well as demo units in stores. In a statement shared with Bloomberg, Apple says that not all iPhone Duo units are affected and that those that are tend to show the display fault early on. The company added that users who experience problems with their iPhone Duo display should contact AppleCare for a replacement.
Not long ago, Apple treated independent repair like an act of outright hostility. The Cupertino giant locked down parts with serial-number pairing, while repair tools remained firmly out of reach of anyone outside its authorized repair network. More importantly, the company waged a legal and lobbying battle against right-to-repair legislation.
I've covered enough of these fights over the years to know what a shift looks like. That's why what happened in October 2026 genuinely caught me off guard. The day the iPhone Duo went on sale, what may be the most mechanically complex iPhone to date, Apple pulled off a surprising about-face. It published teardown-style repair manuals for a handful of major components.