What is an email alias, and how does it protect your privacy?

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Email spam used to be one of the major annoyances of the digital world. But in recent years, email providers have taken steps to improve our overflowing inboxes, which were often riddled with distractions and unwanted mail, like hyperbolic promotions and attempts to steal your data.

But that doesn't mean the problem has gone completely. While we can often feel helpless to this issue, there are a selection of ways to ease the problem. One of the easiest and best ways to go about it is with email aliases.

What is an email alias?

An email alias sounds more dramatic than it is. In simple terms, this is an alternative email address that lets you receive emails without sharing your address. This alias will reroute all incoming messages to your primary account.

An alias isn't a new email account or even a new inbox; think of it more as a different way to write your email that still reaches the same destination. Or, in other words, it is a bit like giving out a different mailing address without changing where you actually live.

There are three common types of email aliases:

• Plus addressing: A way to organise your email efficiently. By adding a + symbol and a category, you can add rules to your emails to filter them by source. For example, giving Youremail+shopping@email.com for all shopping website promotions.

• Provider aliases: Mainly used for businesses to have specific emails for sections, while all going to the same inbox. Such as info@companyname.com.

• Masked/forwarding aliases: These are mainly about privacy. Instead of giving your real email, a completely random one will be generated, while still sending your email to your real inbox, as available with a service like Proton Mail.

How email aliases can protect your privacy

Sometimes, email aliases are simply helpful ways to organise your inbox, or effective tools for making it easier to contact your business. However, a lot of the time, the main benefit is protecting your privacy.

This is done in a few ways, but mainly by reducing how much your email appears online. Of course, your aliases will still appear and can be used, but these can be deleted at any time. Your actual core email address becomes harder to find the more you use aliases.

That means more privacy, as it hides your main address from marketers, spam, and phishing attempts.

When your data is used, it is also easier to identify who has misused it. If you give email aliases in certain situations, it is easier to track where they have been misused. As soon as you can tell someone is misusing an alias, you can delete it and start again, instead of being stuck with a boatload of spam and no clear way to tell how they have your email address.

As useful as aliases can be for privacy, they aren't a surefire solution to keeping you safe online. They don't stop tracking cookies, and they don't automatically encrypt emails.

Types of email aliases (and how they differ)

As we mentioned above, there are three main types of email aliases. Each one has a different purpose, but all three can be useful depending on your needs.

Plus addressing (yourname+label@…)

Think of plus addressing as an organisational alias. It works by adding a + symbol to the end of the name part of your email before the @ symbol, along with a category. For example, if your email is testing@gmail.com, you could add a + symbol to make it testing+shopping@gmail.com.

With this type of email alias, you can use it as a category in different situations. A shopping + tag when you sign up for mailing lists from your favourite shops, one for subscriptions, and one for emails related to your house.

Then, as an extra step, you can make rules within your email to file any email sent to these aliases into specific folders. This is less about privacy and more about keeping everything organised.

On top of that, this is a great way to know which of your aliases has been compromised if you start getting lots of spam or emails you don't want.

However, it is worth noting that some sites will block + label aliases, so they aren't always a sure-fire solution. Not to mention, there isn't really any privacy here, as it is still very clear what your real email address is.

Provider aliases (multiple addresses, one inbox)

These are most often seen in business. For example, when you get in touch with a company, and they have an address like info@ or press@, these are examples of provider aliases.

They are specific addresses linked to the same account, letting you give out different versions of your email to those who need them.

This can be useful if you use your email for both public and private uses, such as a business side and a personal side.

However, some services can put limits on how many of these you can generate. Also, like + aliases above, these are still closely tied to you, and people can reverse-engineer them to find your address.

Masked/forwarding aliases

Masked or forwarding aliases are all about security and privacy. The idea is simple: you generate a completely random email address, but anything sent to that address will come straight to your actual email.

This type of email alias typically offers the strongest privacy benefits, as it fully hides the 'real' email address and can be disabled if need be. You can even create and disable them for specific websites or people. This makes it a great way to protect your privacy when signing up for a service that you're not completely sure is safe.

When to use an email alias

We've touched on what an email alias is and why you might want to use one, but what are some specific examples of their real-world scenarios?

You could use them for:

• Newsletters, sweepstakes, or coupon pop-ups:
• Shopping accounts and receipts/delivery updates
• Free trials
• Apps you're testing
• Event registration/public WiFi/one-off downloads
• Any service you might not keep long-term

With all of these scenarios, the idea is to use them whenever you want the ability to sever communication easily, or something you want to file away easily.

Put simply, if you wouldn't want an email from them in a year, consider an alias.

How to start using email aliases in 5 minutes

Email aliases can seem daunting, but they're actually very easy to get started with. Realistically, you can get them set up in just five minutes with a few easy steps.

Firstly, pick your main inbox. This is where emails from the aliases will come in, so it is best to use your core account.

Then, choose your email alias method from the three mentioned above (plus, provider and masked). Proton is a solid option if you want to try out the latter.

From here, start with two to three categories to set up an alias for. These could be shopping, newsletters, accounts, etc. Choosing specific categories stops things from getting too messy too quickly.

Then, set up a filter/label system for these new aliases straight away. This will make the system feel instantly actionable as you watch specific emails filter out of your view.

Finally, and very importantly, save a quick note of which aliases you've used in which places. This will be important if you ever need to recover your account.

Tools that can create aliases

It isn't just email providers that offer aliases; you can actually use them through a few different services.

The Apple iCloud ecosystem offers a masked email forwarding system through 'Hide My Email'. This generates a random address that will forward the email to you (an alias, in other words).

Equally, some providers, such as Outlook, offer aliases in their settings. The amount of choice will depend on the provider that you are using. Aliases in Gmail are more limited to Workspace accounts.

There are also some dedicated masking services, focused on keeping your email safe from prying eyes. These are usually locked behind a paywall, but they offer the most options for aliases.

Finally, some password managers can generate masked emails during sign-ups; for example, Proton Pass offers email alias tools via Proton's ecosystem (including SimpleLogin integration), which can be convenient if you want passwords and aliases in one place.

Best practices

While email aliases can be a really helpful tool for optimizing your email, they can also become unwieldy very quickly. To avoid this, there are a few key things to keep in mind while using them.

Firstly, try to focus on using aliases for high-spam categories, such as shopping and newsletters. If you start making and using them for absolutely every area, you'll quickly lose track.

Instead, reserve your core email account for critical accounts such as banking, healthcare, and taxes - all of your important emails.

While setting up aliases is useful, you should then actually act on them. If you start getting spam from a certain alias, turn it off to cut off the spammer's connection.

It is also important to keep a simple naming scheme (if you're using readable aliases). This helps you keep track and remember what address to give in different circumstances.

On top of this, keeping a directory somewhere of your aliases will be crucial, unless you have an unbelievably good memory.

Downsides and trade-offs to consider

We've touched on a lot of the benefits of email aliases here, but it is important to remember the issues, too. Most notably, some websites will reject certain formats, usually the + symbol ones.

You'll also need to keep a good record of what aliases you use in each place. If you ever need to recover an account, this will be an important step to remember and can cause a lot of pain down the line.

While these can be an incredibly helpful tool for getting organised and blocking spam, they are also one more thing to manage. Before getting started on setting them up, decide if this all sounds like an added benefit or a chore in your life.

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