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You’ve heard of burner phones. What about burner email?So much of the internet now requires that you hand over your email address before you’re able to use any servicesfrom an app you’ve downloaded to signing up for a newsletter or redeeming a special offer online.But who says you have to give your real email address? Next time you’re asked, consider using an email mask.There are a growing number of services that give out disguised email addresses and relay any messages to your actual address. Experts say this can be a powerful tool to safeguard privacy and security.Here are some pointers on the whys and hows of email masking: Mask on The idea behind email masking is simple. The masking service gives you a randomized address you can use as a decoy instead of your actual email. It can be a series of unrelated words, or a string of letters and numbers. When someone sends a message to the burner email, it will be automatically routed to your address without anyone knowing.Providers include privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo’s Email Protection service, Firefox Relay from browser maker Mozilla, email service FastMail, and independent services like Addy.io. The encrypted service Proton Mail offers email masking with its password manager and standalone SimpleLogin service. There are many others.It’s one of the features Apple offers users subscribing to its iCloud+ or Apple One services. When you’re using the Safari browser app on your iPhone and need to input your email, you can tap the field above the onscreen keyboard to “Hide My Email,” which then creates a random address as a substitute.It’s also available on Mac computers with the desktop Safari browser or Mail app. If you’re using a different browser or app, you can still manually create a random email address by going into your iCloud settings. A Key Feature Most services have a free version with basic options and a premium tier with more features.Some free services can only receive emails but not reply to them. However, an important feature users should look for is the ability to do both, said Proton CEO Andy Yen.“Maybe you never reply to a newsletter and that’s fine,” said Yen. But it’s a problem if, for example, you used your email alias to buy something online and there’s an issue with your order that the site needs to ask you about.“Then the ability to reply is actually pretty important,” he said.Most masking services have a dashboard control panel where you can view the various alias addresses you’ve activated. If you notice one starting to get a lot of spam, just turn it off. When should I use it? Mask your email when you want to add an extra layer of privacy or protect yourself from data leaks or unauthorized information sharing.An email mask is a “general-purpose tool that can be used in any context,” says Santiago Andrigo, principal product manager at Mozilla.However, he recommends using it in two key situations. The first is when you’re unsure what a website will do with your email address.“Masking your email gives you controlif you start receiving unwanted messages, you can easily block any emails coming to that email mask,” Andrigo said.The second scenario is “when your association with a service could reveal sensitive personal information,” he said. For example, if you join an online community for a specific medical condition or a minority group, a data breach could expose your participation. Email fail There are myriad reasons not to give out your email address to anyone who wants it.It could be sold to marketers or shady data brokers, eroding your privacy by helping them build a profile of you for legitimate or nefarious purposes.If your address ends up on the wrong mailing list, it could result in more junk or phishing emails. And if an online service is hacked, attackers could make off with logins, passwords and other personal information.Using unique passwords for all your online accountstypically with the help of a password manageris good cybersecurity practice. “But the real pain point for any user is actually not the password getting leaked, but actually the email getting leaked,” said Yen.Changing your password after a data breach is standard practice but it’s a lot harder to change another piece of sensitive information, your email addressunless you’re using a mask. False solutions There are other so-called hacks that you might have heard about.You could set up a throwaway account with a free email service like Gmail or Yahoo. But it’s tedious to do this.Some Gmail users add a plus sign and an extra phrase or combination of characters between their username and the @ sign. It helps track who’s sharing your address as well as filter messages.But “from a privacy standpoint, that does nothing,” said Yen. “Because people can just simply take away the plus and get your original address.” What about the man in the middle? Email masks use their servers to relay message traffic between the sender and the recipient. So how can you be sure those servers are private?Look for reputable providers that promise not to keep your messages. If you’re shopping around for an email masking service, Yen advises checking if it has “proper terms and conditions,” a privacy policy and is based in a jurisdiction where it could be legally held accountable.“We state very clearly we’re not keeping a copy of anything that passes through our servers,” Yen said.Firefox Relay says in its FAQs that it does not “read or store any of your messages.”“In the event that an email cannot be delivered to you, we will keep it on our servers and delete it after it has been delivered (in no event will we hold onto it for more than three days),” it says.Apple says it “doesn’t read or process any of the content” in email messages that pass through Hide My Email except for standard spam filtering.“All email messages are deleted from our relay servers after they’re delivered to you, usually within seconds,” the iPhone maker says. AP Technology Writer Barbara Ortutay in Oakland, Calif. contributed to this report. Is there a tech topic that you think needs explaining? Write to us at onetechtip@ap.org with your suggestions for future editions of One Tech Tip. Kelvin Chan, AP Business Writer
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E-Commerce
Shares in foreign and domestic car companies are down since yesterdays market close after President Donald Trump announced his latest round of tariffs on Wednesday. Those tariffs include a 25% levy on automobiles imported into the United States. However, the tariffs could also affect cars made in America. Heres what you need to know. 25% tariffs on imported cars and auto parts Yesterday, Trump announced that he would enforce 25% tariffs on all cars and other automobiles imported into the United States. However, as NBC News notes, while Trumps original announcement just referred to tariffs on imported vehicles, the tariffs apply to parts of vehicles made in America as well. A fact sheet about the 25% auto tariffs posted on the White Houses official website states, The 25% tariff will be applied to imported passenger vehicles (sedans, SUVs, crossovers, minivans, cargo vans) and light trucks, as well as key automobile parts (engines, transmissions, powertrain parts, and electrical components), with processes to expand tariffs on additional parts if necessary.” The announcement of the tariffs drew condemnation from America’s trading partners and auto-industry players. Jennifer Safavian, CEO of Autos Drive America, a trade group that represents international automakers who operate in the United States, said the tariffs “will make it more expensive to produce and sell cars in the United States, ultimately leading to higher prices, fewer options for consumers, and fewer manufacturing jobs in the U.S.,” as NBC News reported. How much will car prices rise? Due to the tariffs, the price of cars in America is expected to rise by thousands of dollars in the next few weeks, reports CNN. But it wont just be foreign cars sold in America that will see higher price tags. Because the tariffs also cover imported parts that American car manufacturers need to make their cars in America, those parts will become pricier to obtain, leading to higher domestic car prices as well. This means it will become costlier for even U.S. car makers to make carsand some of those costs will need to be passed on to buyers of American-made vehicles. Automaker stock prices fall Unsurprisingly, shares in many automakers fell after Trumps tariff announcement on Wednesday, although some seem to be stabilizing in premarket trading on Thursday. Heres a roundup of the current movement in automaker stocks sold on U.S. markets. Prices reflect the time of this writing in premarket trading on Thursday morning. General Motors Company (NYSE: GM): down 6.5% Tesla, Inc. (Nasdaq TSLA): up 0.71% Ford Motor Company (NYSE: F): down 0.4% Stellantis N.V. (NYSE: STLA): down .1.7% Toyota Motor Corporation (NYSE: TM): down 1.74% Rivian Automotive, Inc. (Nasdaq: RIVN): down 0.41% Honda Motor Co., Ltd. (NYSE: HMC): down 1.45% President Trump said the tariffs will begin being collected on April 3next Thursday. The president said the tariffs will be permanent. The White House fact sheet detailing the tariffs says that the U.S. auto industry “is vital to national security and has been undermined by excessive imports threatening Americas domestic industrial base and supply chains.” The tariffs, the White House says, are meant to protect it.
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E-Commerce
Major antiabortion groups were gathering in the nation’s capital on Thursday to begin a lobbying effort with Congress and President Donald Trump’s administration aimed at eliminating funding for Planned Parenthood ahead of the Supreme Court hearing a case in April that could strip the organization’s funding in South Carolina.The antiabortion groups are taking aim at abortion providers under an initiative called Defund Planned Parenthood, which targets federal Medicaid funding for the reproductive healthcare provider.“This event begins an intensive round of outreach to the GOP, calling on them to take advantage of this unique moment to defund the abortion industry,” Students for Life, the national antiabortion group organizing the event, said in a statement.The Hyde Amendment already restricts government funding for most abortions, and less than 5% of the services Planned Parenthood provides are abortions, according to the organization’s 2023 report. Planned Parenthood also provides other forms of reproductive healthcare, including contraception, treatment for sexually transmitted infections and cancer screenings, often for low-income patients.Vicki Ringer, Planned Parenthood’s South Carolina director of public affairs, said claims that Planned Parenthood uses Medicaid funding for abortion is “an attempt to mislead the public” and emphasized Planned Parenthood’s role in providing broader reproductive healthcare.“We should be expanding healthcare to low-income people rather than trying to kick off these people who rely on us for healthcare,” Ringer said.Rachel Rebouche, dean of Temple University’s Beasley School of Law in Philadelphia, said the Defund Planned Parenthood movement has been building for 10 years but has gained momentum as the antiabortion movement has been emboldened by Trump’s presidential victory and by his fellow Republicans winning control of Congress in November.“We’re seeing more enthusiasm in states like South Carolina and others to close down Planned Parenthood under the banner of stopping abortions, which their laws already do,” she said.The Supreme Court announced it would hear a case involving South Carolina’s attempt to strip Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood. Experts say the lawsuit could prompt similar efforts in conservative states across the country to chip away at the organization’s funding.Almost 100 conservative members of Congress signed an amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to side with South Carolina. The state already bans abortion after six weeks of pregnancy, before many people know they’re pregnant.In February, a panel of judges in the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a lower court ruling that attempted to force Planned Parenthood to repay millions of dollars of Medicaid funding in Texas and Louisiana.If the Supreme Court sides with South Carolina, Rebouche said, there may be a wider impact on healthcare by “giving states broad power to exclude healthcare that is unpopular or politically disfavored,” such as contraception. Targeting Planned Parenthood might also have a negative effect on maternal and infant mortality rates and could cost more money in the long run by cutting off low-income patients from vital preventive reproductive healthcare, she said.During a 2015 push to strip Planned Parenthood funding, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that doing so would cost the government $130 million over 10 years.Meanwhile, lawmakers in at least three statesMissouri, Ohio, and South Carolinahave introduced bills this year aiming to create tax breaks for antiabortion centers.The strategies come during a time when abortion rights advocates are warning that Trump and his Cabinet hold significant power to restrict medication abortion access nationwide.Rather than immediately heeding calls from antiabortion allies to restrict Medicaid funding for clinics that provide abortions, Trump has made quieter moves after waffling on the issue on the campaign trail.Trump reinstated a policy that requires foreign nongovernmental agencies to certify that they don’t provide or promote abortion if they receive U.S. aid for family planning assistance. He also pardoned several antiabortion activists convicted of blockading abortion clinics and used wording related to fetal personhood in an executive order rolling back protections for transgender people.The Republican president has appointed abortion opponents in some key Cabinet positions that could affect the availability of medication abortion and contraception, Medicaid coverage for family planning services, collection of abortion-related data and abortion access for troops and veterans.Advocates on either side of the abortion debate are waiting to see if Trump’s Department of Justice will revive the Comstock Act, a 19th-century obscenity law, to restrict the mailing of medication abortion or other materials used for abortions. Attorney General Pam Bondi has a history of defending abortion restrictions, and her confirmation was celebrated by abortion opponents. The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Christine Fernando, Associated Press
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E-Commerce
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