Once exclusively used by marketers, hidden email metadata tracking tools are now deployed by a multitude of actors, including patent trolls, clients and cybercriminals, while the information they provide is making its way into courtrooms as admissible evidence.
Called spymail, the tool works by inserting a line of code in an email that is activated once a user downloads that email’s embedded pictures in their application, explained Chad Gilles, a former patent attorney at McAndrews, Held & Malloy, who in June moved to spymail solution provider MailControl.
