alt Hacker NewsEveryone in this thread suggesting a “data leak” or “compromise” is totally missing the fact that this is how Apollo works. This is often times overlooked by Apollo customers themselves. You have to opt out of customer data sharing (and in doing so lose out on the value of the product): https://knowledge.apollo.io/hc/en-us/articles/20727684184589...
Not commenting on whether this is good or ethical (or even totally legal), but this is what is happening behind the scenes.
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And the sad thing is, I can guarantee this thread alone will be great marketing for Apollo and they will gain a pile of new enquiries Monday morning.
Another way these companies get data is they have credits. It costs a credit for a salesperson to enrich the data of someone they're trying to contact. There are 2 ways to gain credits: 1 - cash; 2 - the salesperson installs a plugin in their inbox and it scrapes all contact info in the inbox.
ZoomInfo is the most aggressive about this.
re apollo: inbox scraping is what they're describing here [1]
> Apollo does leverage its large network of over 2 million contributors to improve the scope and accuracy of its database of business contact information and run verification checks that result in a better user experience for its entire customer base. Most of the data we collect from our Apollo users simply forms part of our verification system to check and confirm existing information in the Apollo database.
[1] https://knowledge.apollo.io/hc/en-us/articles/20727684184589...
For a little more color for people unfamiliar with modern sales/marketing:
1. A user signs up to BrowserStack
2. BrowserStack (automatically) upload the submitted user’s information to Apollo
3. Apollo “enrich” the user’s details using information they already have about the person, e.g: company revenue, LinkedIn profile
4. Sales reps at BrowserStack use the enriched information to identify leads, bucket for marketing etc.
Apollo’s customer data sharing adds any information BrowserStack send to Apollo to the person’s profile with Apollo, accessible to all Apollo customers.
For example, any other Apollo customer can search something like “email addresses for decision makers at Example, Inc.” and get back a list including your email address (if you told BrowserStack you are a decision maker at Example, Inc.)
Every single marketing team is doing all of this, the only reason it was obvious in this case is that the OP used a unique email address for BrowserStack. If you sign up for any business product online, you surely have a profile in Apollo filled with details about you gathered from around the web (and details you submitted).
edit: https://www.apollo.io/privacy-policy/remove opt out link but Apollo are just one of many companies offering this service