There’s a new service that, for a measly $50 per year, lets subscribers see who really didn't read their e-mail, and who was lying when they said didn’t. Sounds reasonable on the surface, but digging a little deeper into DidTheyReadIt? raises some questions, privacy being among them.
"In a world where spam is an overwhelming presence in everyone's inbox, they may not see or read your e-mail," said Alistair Rampell, founder of Rampell Software, which created the service. "DidTheyReadIt? is designed to assure you that they did, and to let you do something about it if they didn't."
DidTheyReadIt? tracks where and when a user’s e-mail is or isn't read by a recipient, without the recipient’s knowledge.
One report described it as offering a new and quiet way to harvest behavioral information about friends, colleagues, and potential customers.
But one online privacy advocate comes close to calling it a new tool for snoopery. "There's a type of covert surveillance here," said Electronic Privacy Information Center president Marc Rotenberg. "Just from a technology viewpoint, it's basically an evil service."
DidTheyReadIt? subscribers get a message telling them when an e-mail message is opened, the geographic location of the recipient, and how long that person spent reading the message. The software is said to work with any e-mail protocol now in use. And unlike other e-mail services which offer the return-receipt option, or MSGTAG, which tells users when their outgoing messages have been opened, DidTheyReadIt? keeps the notification secret from the mail recipient.
Rampell isn't exactly unaware of the implications. "It's a potential invasion of privacy," he acknowledged when interviewed by the New York Times, "but it's also a potential tool for changing communication." Rampell defends the program as a shield against "overzealous" spam filters sending legitimate e-mail to junk folders.
"I won't deny that it has a potentially stealth purpose," Rampell added, noting that his company has been hit with over a thousand negative feedback messages since launching the service in late May. "One of [the criticisms] is that they think that this is evil and that I should go to jail," he told the Times. "The other is that the product does not always work."
The program works by way of Web bugs, small files that DidTheyReadIt? embeds in each e-mail sent through their service. The bugs are downloaded when recipients open the messages, with DidTheyReadIt? servers recording the whys and wherefores.
Weighing the pros and cons of the service in a recent issue of USA Today, writer Kevin Maney pointed out that “the tracking service could be used by job hunters who want to see if their résumés were read, or by salespeople wanting to track pitches.” Maney also noted that spam filters can sometimes block e-mail sent with attachments, leaving the sender thinking an e-mail got through when it didn't. "It can be useful peace of mind to know people got your e-mail," Rampell told the paper.
Said EPIC’s Rotenberg: "Other than the prospect of DidTheyReadIt? becoming just another way for spammers to learn more about target recipients' e-mail habits, the program just doesn't have that much value for people who know each other already."
