In an announcement made on Saturday, Google may finally end its practice of scanning Gmail messages to provide targeted ads to users. Scanning emails for advertising purposes has been an in-built feature of Gmail since its launch.
Earlier, Google exempted business accounts from being scanned but it scanned the emails of personal Gmail users. However, as Google looks to market its cloud services to more businesses, the feature has proved to be an obstacle to convince companies of Google’s commitment to data protection and corporate privacy.
However, the announcement won’t mean that users will see an end to Google advertising. Google still reserves the right to carry out consumer profiling through its other services like Google Search and Youtube to provide targeted ads to consumers. With the announcement, Google may finally be able to win over users who are wary of some of Google’s mild privacy breaching practices.