Brave announced this week that its browser now supports email aliases, allowing users to sign up for websites and online services without sharing their real email addresses.
To use the feature, users must first create a Brave account and provide their actual email address. Once logged in, clicking an email field on a website triggers a pop-up offering the option to insert an alias instead. If the pop-up does not appear, right-clicking the field provides access to the same option. Emails sent to the alias are forwarded to the user’s primary inbox, and Brave deletes the message from its servers after forwarding.
Brave said it built the feature to address a specific privacy vulnerability: websites routinely use email addresses as personal identifiers to target users with ads. Ad tech companies, including Meta, can match an email address provided to a retailer with the address they already have on file, enabling cross-site tracking of purchases and browsing activity. Additionally, if a website storing a user’s email is hacked, that address can be exposed and shared with data brokers.
On the privacy and security side, Brave says it does not read the contents of forwarded emails — processing is limited to spam and virus filtering. All data in Brave accounts is encrypted at rest, and any notes saved alongside an alias are stored locally on the device by default. If sync is enabled, those notes are encrypted end-to-end.
Because the feature is new, Brave cautioned that some forwarded mail may initially land in spam folders, but expects deliverability to improve as it builds a reputation as a mail provider.
At launch, Brave users receive five free email aliases. Additional aliases will be made available to Premium plan subscribers in the future.
Source: TechCrunch