At AnchorDesk, Rafe Needleman wrote down what we think about DidTheyReadIt, a brandnew service that allows email senders to see when the recipient reads the message, on what computer, ... (other examples of such privacy-invading services are ReadNotify and MsgTag).
DidTheyReadIt does this by using a small embedded image - whose access is traced back to the DidTheyReadIt servers - in the emails you send via them. While Web-based and text-based email clients have the possibility to limit the use of these "beacons", Office 2003 also offers the feature to turn off the automatic download of images in email. For all others, there is the option to run mail filters that e.g. color such email messages to see who is bugging you, or you can run an email tracking blocker from e.g. Wizard Industries. However, you never know what these guys do to your email behind the curtains of their 2.99 USD piece of software ...
Read Rafe's column at http://reviews-zdnet.com.com/AnchorDesk/4520-7297_16-5138088.html.
Posted by Patrick Van Renterghem at June 7, 2004 12:21 PM