The Brave browser has introduced a new feature that could be another reason for users to choose this Chrome alternative. This feature, which provides email aliases to users, allows signing up on websites and online services without needing to provide a personal email address.
To use this feature, users must first create a Brave account and register their real email address in it. After signing into the browser, when clicking on the email field on a website, a window appears offering the option to use an email alias. If this window does not appear, users can access the option by right-clicking on the email field.
After selecting this option, the email alias is automatically entered into the website form and all messages sent to that address will be forwarded to the user’s main email account.
Brave has stated that using email aliases can help protect users’ privacy; because websites often use email addresses as a personal identifier and thereby enable targeting users with advertisements. For example, major advertising companies like Meta can match an email address that a user provides to a retail website with information in their database and thus track the user’s online activity, purchases, or content viewed.
On the other hand, if a website where the user’s main email address is registered is hacked, that address may fall into attackers’ hands and its related information could be exposed or shared with data brokers.
Brave says it developed this new feature to address this security gap. The company emphasizes that it does not read the contents of emails sent to aliases and only processes them to identify and filter spam and viruses. After an email is forwarded, the related information is deleted from Brave’s servers.
According to TechCrunch, all data in users’ Brave accounts is also stored in encrypted storage. Notes that users save alongside an alias are kept locally on the device unless sync is enabled. If sync is enabled, those notes are protected with end-to-end encryption.
Because the email alias feature is newly introduced, Brave has warned that some outgoing messages may initially be sent to spam folders. However, the company expects this to improve over time as Brave’s reputation as an email provider grows.
Currently, Brave users have access to five free email aliases. The company has stated that in the future more email aliases will be made available to Premium plan users.