You pay for a free Gmail or Yahoo account with your data – 5 reasons

“There is no free ride.” You’ve probably heard some version of this saying. You might think you’re getting nothing when you don’t put any money in, but the cost can be more than what’s in your wallet.

When you sign up for a free email service, you are giving away valuable information about yourself. Your purchases, browsing activities, reservations, subscriptions and even your personal messages are vulnerable. This data may be collected to target you with ads or sell to other companies. Tap or click here to see how the biggest email services are targeting you.

Gmail and Yahoo are free and easy to use. what’s the catch? A lot, in fact, especially when it comes to your privacy. There are many options, and we’ll tell you about one that puts privacy and security at the fore.

What is the option?
If you’re looking to quit Gmail, Yahoo or Outlook, we recommend trying out our sponsor, Startmail. Let’s go over some of the key reasons why it’s time to switch and finally take back some of your privacy. We will focus on the largest email provider, Gmail.

1. Get a Huge Increase in Privacy
Google uses Gmail to track your payment methods, purchases, reservations, web activity, location history, and even what you watch on YouTube. You can opt out of some of these trackers, but think about how much information Google already has about you.

Google can access your personal messages, and no matter what you do, you’ll still see targeted ads in your inbox.

StartMail does not collect or share data with anyone else. Your activities are not tracked or recorded. StartMail promises to never read your email messages. Want to remain anonymous? You can create as many aliases as you want and use the email addresses that you find appropriate.

2. Encryption Leaves Hackers Out in the Cold
Gmail uses Transport Layer Security encryption, which only works if the recipient of the message is using a service that supports TLS, including Gmail. But even if two Gmail users exchange messages, encryption doesn’t stop Google from spying on your email. You can see proof of this in the messages themselves with suggested answers.

StartMail uses the TLS protocol in addition to password-protected messages. You can send PPM email to anyone, even if they are not using encryption. Just click the Encrypt button while composing the message.

Your Startmail inbox and folders are also encrypted and stored in their own “vault”. No one can access these files except you.

3. You won’t miss out on familiar features
Like Gmail, Startmail can be accessed online from any device. It is compatible with Outlook, Thunderbird and Apple Mail. You can create multiple custom domains for business or personal use.

StartMail has the usual bells and whistles, including search, font styles, image embedding, spell checker, keyboard shortcuts, and signatures. And with Startmail, there’s no download or installation to worry about.

4. How much is your privacy worth?
StartMail’s $59.95 annual subscription includes 10 GB of storage space, which is plenty. You can view your storage usage at any time by going to Settings > Current Storage. There is currently no option to buy more storage.