Who can see that I opened this email?
This page is for you as a reader, not as a business owner. If a small business emails you through bernard, this is what they can and cannot see about whether you read it.
The prompt
“Explain in plain words what a business using bernard can see about whether I opened their email, and how I stop it.”
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The short answer
They can see it only if you agreed to it. Nobody is recorded by default, and there is no way for a business, or for bernard, to record you as having agreed on your behalf. It has to have been your own press, on your own screen, against a sentence that said what it meant.
If you did agree, the sentence you read was this one, with the business named:
[The business] will also see which of their emails you open and which links you press, including your approximate location and the mail app you use, for up to a year. You can stop this at any time from the link in every email.
Those exact words are stored with your answer, so what you agreed to cannot be quietly changed later.
What is recorded
- Which of their emails you opened, and when.
- Which links in those emails you pressed, and where each one went.
- Which mail app and device you used, and, where bernard can work it out from your connection, roughly where you were. The sentence you agreed to covers the location because it may be recorded; today it often is not, and the business simply sees nothing there.
What is not
- Anything else in your mailbox. Bernard sees their message, not your inbox.
- Anything about email from a different business, even one also using bernard. Each business has its own separate record and they never meet.
- What you do after you arrive on their website.
Why the numbers they see are careful
Modern mail apps often fetch the images in a message before you have looked at it, and some workplace systems press every link to check it is safe. Bernard flags those and keeps them out of the main count, then tells the business how many were uncertain. It does not present a machine as a reader, and it does not tell the business you ignored them just because nothing was recorded.
How to stop it
Open your email preferences page for that business. There are two separate switches:
- Let them see which emails I open. Turn this off and no new opens or clicks are recorded from that moment.
- Unsubscribe. Stops their marketing email altogether.
They are independent. Turning one off does not touch the other.
Stopping is not erasing. What was already recorded stays until it ages out after a year. If you want it removed sooner, ask the business - see What does bernard do with my data, and is it GDPR-compliant? for what they are obliged to do.
If you are the business, not the reader
Can I see who opened my email? is your side of the same story, and How do people agree to opens and clicks being recorded? is how somebody comes to agree in the first place.
Questions people ask
- Is this happening to me right now?
- Only if you pressed something that said so. Nobody is recorded by default. If you have never seen a sentence about opens and clicks and never pressed a switch, nothing about your reading is being recorded, and no approval anybody gives on their side changes that.
- What can the business actually see?
- Which of their emails you opened, which links in them you pressed, and which mail app you used. Roughly where you were can be recorded too, and the sentence you agreed to says so, but today it usually is not and the business simply sees nothing there. They cannot see anything else in your mailbox, anything you did on another company’s email, or anything you did after leaving their website.
- How long is it kept?
- Up to a year, then the individual records are removed. The business keeps the totals for their own campaigns, which no longer say anything about you.
- How do I stop it?
- On your email preferences page for that business there is a switch reading Let them see which emails I open. Turning it off stops any new recording straight away. It takes effect on its own; nobody has to approve it and the business is not asked.
- Does stopping it delete what is already there?
- No. Stopping stops new records; what was already recorded ages out after a year. If you want it erased sooner, ask the business directly - they have a route for that and are obliged to use it.
- Does this affect whether I get their emails?
- No. It is a separate switch from unsubscribing. You can be recorded and still unsubscribe, or stay subscribed and not be recorded. They are on the same page and neither changes the other.