Your Guide to Google and Yahoo Email Changes in 2024

Mar 4, 2024 | Blog

Essential Insights on New Anti-Spam Measures

As email continues to play a pivotal role in daily interactions, ensuring its safety and integrity has become essential. In response to the evolving nature of email communication and security, Google and Yahoo email changes were announced in October 2023.1 Bulk senders (or those who send 5,000 messages or more a day) must now authenticate their emails, allow for simple unsubscription and ensure email compliance with a specified spam threshold.

These new guidelines present a chance for all email senders, whether bulk senders or non-bulk senders, to review their marketing strategies, ensuring they are providing personalized and relevant content with each message. In this blog, we’ll break down everything you need to know regarding Google and Yahoo’s new email sender guidelines.

Overview of Google and Yahoo’s Email Changes

Spam and email-related cyberattacks, such as phishing, have been on the rise in recent years. In fact, in 2022, 48% of all emails received were marked as spam.2 To lower the threat of unwanted or dangerous emails, both Google and Yahoo announced their new set of email sender policies in October 2023. These policies officially went into effect in February 2024.

Google and Yahoo released similar policies focusing on three specific requirements.

Bulk Email Senders Now Must:

1. Authenticate Their Email

To enhance user confidence in email authenticity, senders must now leverage stronger email authentication measures, including SPF, DKIM and DMARC.

Sender Policy Framework (SPF): Enables bulk email senders to authorize legitimate senders by permitting specific domains and IPs to send emails on behalf of their domain, reducing spam complaints.
DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM): Protects email content integrity by adding digital signatures to message headers, serving as a verification mark to prevent alterations.
DMARC (Domain-Based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance): Aligns messages with SPF and/or DKIM checkpoints, allowing senders to instruct receiving servers on handling misaligned emails. DMARC provides options to accept, quarantine or reject such emails, safeguarding domains against phishing, spoofing and business email compromise.

2. Enable Easy Unsubscription

Those sending over 5,000 emails a day must now support one-click unsubscribe functionality, allowing recipients to opt out of email subscriptions easily. Furthermore, unsubscription requests need to be honored within two days.

3. Maintain a Low Spam Rate

Lastly, bulk senders must maintain a spam complaint rate under 0.3%.3 For example, there can’t be more than three spam reports for every 1,000 messages. This is to ensure that users do not receive an abundance of unwanted or unsolicited emails.

Deadlines and Non-Compliance Considerations

Along with the above requirements, there are additional deadlines and non-compliance consequences to consider.

Deadlines

Keep in mind that Google and Yahoo email changes are continuous and adapt over time in response to new developments in email security. As a result, enforcement of new mandates is gradual, and both companies may change deadlines in the future. For example, the deadline to implement the one-click unsubscribe feature for both has been pushed back to June 2024.3

If you want to look for updates on either Google or Yahoo’s email sender guidelines, be sure to check back on both company’s sender guidelines web pages:

Non-Compliance Consequences

Bulk senders who do not follow the new policies put in place by Google and Yahoo will face the following consequences:

Email Deliverability Issues: Emails that do not comply with the standards may either be rejected immediately or redirected to recipients’ spam folders, significantly impacting their effectiveness and reach.
Suspended Accounts: Businesses who work within the Google Workspace infrastructure could face the suspension of their Google account. Furthermore, Google states in its Spam and Abuse Policy, “If the problem is domain-wide, we reserve the right to suspend the entire account and deny administrator access to all the Google Workspace services.”

Email Sender Compliance Guidelines for Non-Bulk Senders

If you are not a bulk sender (or send less than 5,000 emails a day), there are still important email sender guidelines to follow. These policies further ensure end-to-end protection of email transactions and communication. They include:

Email senders are required to enable either SPF or DKIM
Sending domains and IP addresses must possess valid Pointer (PTR) records
The spam rate of your message must be maintained below 0.3%
Your message format must adhere to IMF specifications outlined in RFC 5322
Impersonating Gmail in the “From:” headers is prohibited
The domain specified in the sender’s “From:” header must align with the domain in either the return-path header (for SPF) or the DKIM signature header
Forwarded emails must be signed by ARC (Authenticated Received Chain)

Email Sender Guidelines: Best Practices

Now that you have a breakdown of all Google and Yahoo email changes, you may be wondering how to maintain a positive sender reputation and ensure successful email delivery to Gmail and Yahoo users. Here are some best practices to consider going forward, no matter how many emails you send daily:

Keep up Quality Content: Ensure that your emails contain relevant and valuable content. Avoid using spammy language, excessive capitalization or misleading subject lines.
Ensure Consistency: Maintain a consistent sending schedule and volume. Sudden spikes in email volume or irregular sending patterns can trigger spam filters.
Perform Regular List Hygiene: Keep your email list clean by regularly removing inactive or bouncing email addresses. High bounce rates can negatively impact your sender reputation.
Encourage Engagement: Include clear call-to-action buttons and personalized content for recipients to engage with your emails. Higher engagement rates signal to email providers that recipients want your emails.
Follow Opt-in Practices: Only send emails to recipients who have explicitly opted in to receive them. Avoid purchasing email lists or sending unsolicited emails.
Have a Feedback Loop: Monitor feedback loops provided by email providers. This allows you to receive notifications when recipients mark your emails as spam, enabling you to promptly remove them from your list.

Ensure Top-Notch Email Security with Sawyer Solutions

The 2024 Google and Yahoo email changes mark an important advancement for the world of modern-day email, enhancing its functionality by addressing the ever-prominent threat of spam and fraud. By following the Google and Yahoo email sender guidelines, you not only protect your organization but also retain the trust and loyalty of your recipients.

If you’d like further assistance with email security or cybersecurity as a whole, contact the security experts at Sawyer Solutions. We offer customized managed security solutions that align with your budget, including data security, risk management, employee training and more.