Re:My Email Canary
by limmeau on Thursday June 09, 2011 @07:18AM
(#2636706)
An IMAP client somewhere could poll the 'read' state of message 0x12345678 instead, alerting the owner when the message turns 'read'. However, that client would have to have access to the Gmail box...
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But would an attacker read a message marked as unread? A careful attacker would know that this alerts the owner of the mailbox, as he can't remember opening the message.
His canary is a mail that has already been opened, so the attacker assumes he can look at it harmlessly.
You can mark messages un-read again in the gmail UI.
Thanks, I missed that point.
Yep, but it couldn't collect the IP of the attacker.