Email Marketing RulesFrance’s CNIL Rules Push Marketers to Use Opens Even Less
New privacy rules in Europe are placing fresh limits on the use of tracking pixel data, which has already seen its usefulness decline dramatically in the wake of Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection. In the latest move, the French data protection authority CNIL has published its final recommendations on the use of email tracking pixels, which extends the consent requirements of the ePrivacy Directive of 2003 to also cover pixels in emails. Going into effect in mid July 2026, the rules require senders to get explicit permission from subscribers in France for some tracking pixel use cases. The same rules will apply to subscribers in Italy in October.
In general, it’s not the collection of open data that runs afoul of these rules, but rather the use of tracking pixel-derived information for particular uses without permission from the subscriber.
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Chad S. White
GVP of CRM Strategy
Zeta Global
Author of Email Marketing Rules and nearly 4,000 articles about digital and email marketing
