# Gmail Terms of Service: We read your mail **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 18, 2014, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389 "2014-04-18T03:26:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2014, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/21 "2014-04-18T16:45:08Z")
> [@ZipperJJ](#): > > If your bank is sending you private banking information via email then you need to switch banks, not email providers. I have a lot of accounts with banks (business and personal) and none of them are in the habit of sending anything more than secure links, or figures-wise, balance due. > > Free email is not the only option for small businesses. As a small business owner, I think free email is a silly option for small businesses. You should be paying for email service on your own domain just like you pay for phone service and water service. It’s part of running a business now. I agree with this, and though I know it’s snobbish, sending an order to a guy with an “@aol.com” or “@gmail.com” worries me more than sending one to a person at his “@companynamedomain.com” address. A GoDaddy account and domain runs about $100-odd/year (I pay $300 myself, but I do file storage and some other add-ins.) If you’re going to run a business, get your own domain name merely to appear more professional and permanent. ---
**Author:** ![Suburban\_Plankton](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/suburban_plankton/32/219_2.png) [@Suburban\_Plankton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Suburban_Plankton)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2014, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/22 "2014-04-18T20:31:08Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > Although I have no information that Chrome, Firefox or IE is scanning or saving any data from emails, the technology of a browser makes it possible to scan EVERYTHING that you view in HTML. Unless banks send all data as bitmapped images, if it displays on your screen, it can be stored as machine readable data. This is true, but that’s not what \*\*ZipperJJ \*\*was saying. Email that you receive from your bank or other financial institution should never contain any ‘sensitive’ information. They should contain nothing more than general information and links to their website where you can go for further information. So your browser could certainly store the link, but that doesn’t contain any useful information in and of itself. As for the issue of GMail reading your mail: 1. They’ve never, since day one, made any secret about it. 2. You get what you pay for. I’ve used GMail since I was able to wrangle an invitation, and see no reason to stop now. ---
**Author:** ![Merneith](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/57b2e6/32.png) [@Merneith](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merneith)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2014, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/23 "2014-04-18T20:50:00Z")
Anti-virus and spam prevention techniques also use automatic scanning, like Gmail ad servers do (and it’s not just Gmail’s email that serves ads, any more, either.) I didn’t think that should be a surprise to people, either. Really, if you have super sekret secrets, do not write about them on the internet. ---
**Author:** ![Grey\_area](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Grey\_area](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grey_area)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2014, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/24 "2014-04-18T21:14:23Z")
Meh. It’s kinda misleading to say they “read” your mail when it’s an automated scan for keywords. Nobody at Google knows or probably really cares about the actual content of your mail. On a side note, it’s sort of interesting to see what Google (including YouTube) thinks I’d be into based on the ads they present to me. I wonder how accurate these “demographic profiles” I’m sure they have on every user are. Or if staff can access them. ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2014, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/25 "2014-04-18T21:18:28Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > I agree with this, and though I know it’s snobbish, sending an order to a guy with an “@aol.com” or “@gmail.com” worries me more than sending one to a person at his “@companynamedomain.com” address. > > A GoDaddy account and domain runs about $100-odd/year (I pay $300 myself, but I do file storage and some other add-ins.) If you’re going to run a business, get your own domain name merely to appear more professional and permanent. OK - so I get a domain name. What do I need to start hosting an email server? I can use Outlook Exchange correct? Is there and less expensive software I can use that’s fairly easy to set up? ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2014, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/26 "2014-04-18T23:12:44Z")
> [@zoid](#): > > OK - so I get a domain name. > What do I need to start hosting an email server? I can use Outlook Exchange correct? Is there and less expensive software I can use that’s fairly easy to set up? If you are using GoDaddy’s hosting facilities, they can provide some pretty good email software, but you aren’t limited to that. Personally, Outlook would be the last choice of geeks like me. ---
**Author:** ![jabiru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/bbce88/32.png) [@jabiru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jabiru)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2014, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/27 "2014-04-18T23:16:19Z")
If Gmail wants to know that I’ve bought a pair of earrings on Ebay or that my SDMB subscription is due, good luck to them. I only use Gmail for subscribed newsletters and such. ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2014, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/28 "2014-04-18T23:53:28Z")
> [@zoid](#): > > OK - so I get a domain name. > What do I need to start hosting an email server? I can use Outlook Exchange correct? Is there and less expensive software I can use that’s fairly easy to set up? You don’t run an email server, you pay someone to let you use their email server with your domain name that you own. Any Web host should also be able to provide email hosting. Google has paid email hosting (where your email is @yourowndomain.com). You can pay for Exchange hosting if you dig Exchange. Just find someone else to do it. ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2014, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/29 "2014-04-18T23:54:57Z")
> [@Grey\_area](#): > > Meh. > > It’s kinda misleading to say they “read” your mail when it’s an automated scan for keywords. Nobody at Google knows or probably really cares about the actual content of your mail. If people are worried about that, then I hate to clue them in as to how spam filtering works… ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2014, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/30 "2014-04-19T00:08:33Z")
> [@ZipperJJ](#): > > You don’t run an email server, you pay someone to let you use their email server with your domain name that you own. Any Web host should also be able to provide email hosting. Google has paid email hosting (where your email is @yourowndomain.com). You can pay for Exchange hosting if you dig Exchange. Just find someone else to do it. I could run an email server if I wanted to correct? Large busi9nesses must run their own, no? Seems they would want the security of maintaining their own servers. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2014, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/31 "2014-04-19T00:13:17Z")
> [@zoid](#): > > I could run an email server if I wanted to correct? > Large busi9nesses must run their own, no? Seems they would want the security of maintaining their own servers. I used to run one from my work desktop. If you have a static IP address, you could do it from home. But its probably a lot easier and more reliable to just go though a web-hosting company. I think it costs like an extra dollar a month or something on GoDaddy. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2014, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/32 "2014-04-19T00:31:12Z")
> [@zoid](#): > > I could run an email server if I wanted to correct? > Large busi9nesses must run their own, no? Seems they would want the security of maintaining their own servers. Yes, you can set up your own free server using open source software like postfix. In general though, you end up needing to do a bunch of housekeeping to avoid other email servers from thinking your message is spam and refusing to deliver it so it’s almost always better to just let someone else handle mail sending for you. ---
**Author:** ![Inna\_Minnit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Inna\_Minnit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inna_Minnit)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2014, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/33 "2014-04-19T01:04:18Z")
> [@Eliahna](#): > > I don’t understand the sudden fuss. I have always been aware that they scan your email for keywords so they can target ads to you. This was my understanding when I signed up seven-ish years ago. Suddenly everyone is freaking out and Google is clarifying their position in their TOS, but I honestly thought this was always common knowledge. Is there something new about how they read your mail or what they do with the information? Google exists to collect information. If you choose to use their email service, it has always been the trade-off. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2014, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389/34 "2014-04-20T03:46:45Z")
By the time they get to the juicy parts of my emails, I doubt it will still have any useful relevance to them. There is no reason for me to be near the head of their reading list, so I imagine there are a billion or so people whose emails they will read ahead of mine. Does anybody think your mailman never read your post cards or looked to see who was writing to you? Or that long distance telephone operators ever listened in, in the days before direct dial? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gmail-terms-of-service-we-read-your-mail/686389.md?page=1)