Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Ditches Email Scanning On Gmail Accounts For Targeted Ads

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Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) has decided to stop scanning Gmail accounts scanning which was aimed at delivering personalized ads by establishing what users were interested in by introducing the same features on G Suite.

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The email scanning practice had been considered controversial because it was intrusive and infringes on privacy. Google announced the new changes in a blogspot stating that its consumer version of Gmail will benefit from the same settings used in its enterprise version which is part of G Suite. According to the company’s blogspot, G Suite does not feature any ad customization measures and the same will be applied to the regular Gmail service.

“Consumer Gmail content will not be used or scanned for any ads personalization after this change,” stated Google in the blogspot.

G Suite to remain ad free

The new Google blogpost stated that G Suite will continue to operate without ads, meaning the company plans to stop scanning the consumer version of Gmail in order to feature targeted ads. The service has more than 1.2 billion users and is considered one of the biggest email and most successful services in the world. The new changes are believed to be part of the company’s move towards enhancing privacy and security for its users. Google stated in the blogpost that security and privacy would be the primary focus towards better service to Gmail users.

G Suite is composed of various services from Google including Google Drive, Google Spreadsheets, Google Docs and Gmail. The company revealed that it has more than 3 million paying corporate customers that are subscribed to G suite. The enterprise version of Gmail did not feature ads because that would have pushed customers away.

Google is now expected to get its ad targeting data from YouTube or from searches. Ad targeting data from email will be acquired based on user settings though that feature can be disabled. The new changes are expected to make customers feel more secure and satisfied knowing that their emails are not being scanned.

Alphabet stock closed the latest trading session on Friday at 986.09 after a 0.97 percent gain from the previous close.

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