Mozilla had a busy weekend, but it seems to be all worth it.
The organization behind the popular Firefox browser launched an email relay service called 'Firefox Private Relay' to provide an ’email alias’ wherever a company or an online service asks for users email address.
This way, users of the service can avoid giving out their actual email address.
Because the services users are registering to don't have their real email addresses, they won't be able to bombard users with unwanted newsletters or any other unwanted spam mails.
In turn, this should protect users' privacy, as well as their identity.
Initially, Firefox Private Relay is in the testing stage, and only available as an invite-only browser extension for Firefox.
Firefox Private Relay started as an experimental service by Mozilla.
Acting as a proxy email service of sorts, users can reduce unwanted emails and spam because the services they registered to never have their real email address,
“When a form requires your email address, click the relay button to give an alias instead. We will forward emails from the alias to your real inbox,” Mozilla says on its product page. "If any alias starts to receive emails you don't want, you can disable it or delete it completely."
The service will essentially generate a unique alias for users every time they want to sign up to something.
The idea is not new.
How Firefox Private Relay works is similar to what Sign in with Apple does. The concept of an email alias has existed for decades, and there are also similar services that provide disposable emails, too.
But managing them has always been a chore, or email providers didn't allow users access to such a feature.
With Firefox Privacy Relay, Mozilla is making its own approach to preserve users' privacy in emails.
However, the organization may be on to something considering that trust is important for this kind of service. For example, users need to have a Firefox account to start using the service.
Firefox Private Relay’s code is open-sourced on GitHub.