Email Tracking

does anyone know of a 'precise' way of opening emails without the sender knowing?- pls not too complicated

 

Well in basic terms, emails almost always include a special tracking image.
Its usually a very small image file that when you open an e mail, images will be loaded by default on most mail clients......which will trigger the tracker, and then alert the server.

If the recipient is using an email client that’s set not to load images, the tracker won’t load, and you’ll have no way of knowing if that person looked at the email.
This may also be the case if the recipient is using software that blocks these tracking images.

Usually you can use a browser extension today that should achieve your aim......most modern browsers support tracker blocks, so do some googling!

 

when you say 'most modern browsers' -is that not referring to searches etc as opposed to seeing an unopened email in say outlook or another email client which seems inoccuous but has embedded tracker.?In particular unsavoury characters trying to scam?-my outlook wants a password all of a sudden and won't let me in (working on that one) and so I use another email client which just wants to open emails and I'm looking for a prog. (kind of like sandboxie) which would allow access to mails without alerting anyone-thanks

 

No,
If your email is web-based the extensions should help when you open mail from a browser, lets say.....firefox or chrome!
Most pop3 accounts from your ISP can also run web-based from a browser these days!

Access from a browser (not from outlook) will grant you extensions which enable a block on trackers.....thats all my point was!
You can also configure outlook to not load images on open.

Things may change if you believe your account has been compromised?

 

Use an email client that only handles text.

https://sylpheed.sraoss.jp/en/

There is a portable version. You can download your email and see any suspicious links.
If you do use a more common client like Thunderbird or Outlook, make sure "send return receipt" is turned off, or you will be flooded with spam. Also not a good idea to load images and webpages from within emails. There's usually an Unique_ID in the tracker that tells the sender you exist and read the email.

PS Reading the email with Sylpheed will not delete it on the server, so if the message looks OK you can open it with your bowser (as webmail).