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Understanding Email Hashing Options in Adobe Experience Platform

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Employee

2/5/25

Introduction 

As organizations leverage Real-Time CDP to activate audiences across multiple destinations, data security and compliance becomes critical. One key consideration is the use of email hashing when sending audience data to downstream systems.  

Email hashing is the process of converting email addresses into hashed values using functions such as SHA-1, SHA-256, etc. This obfuscates the original email addresses while retained its ability to act as a unique identifier for matching purposes in downstream systems. Hashing enhances data security and ensures compliance with data privacy regulations. Adobe Experience Platform (AEP) provides flexibility in handling hashed email addresses for identity resolution and audience activation.  

Most out of the box Audience Export destination platforms in Real-Time CDP require that no personally identifiable information (PII) is sent in clear. The audiences activated out of Real-Time CDP can be keyed off hashed identifiers (hashed email addresses, hashed phone numbers, etc.). There are several approaches for email addresses hashing and you need to check requirements for each destination before proceeding with one or another option: 

  1. Hash Email Addresses Using Email Transformation in Real-Time CDP: Raw plaintext email addresses are uploaded into Adobe Experience Platform and hashing transformation (SHA256) is applied during the audience activation workflow. Important*: Most batch destinations don’t accept email hashing transformation during activation via destination. Instead, most batch destinations can use SHA256 hashing using calculated attributes during activation. Check requirements for each new destination in the Adobe Real-Time CDP destinations documentation. 
  2. Upload Pre-hashed Email Addresses into Adobe Experience Platform: In this method, email addresses are hashed before they are ingested into Real-Time CDP.  
  3. Hash Email Addresses Using Calculated Fields in Real-Time CDP: Email addresses can be hashed during activation to batch destinations. Instead of applying hashing transformation, select calculated fields in mappings during audience activation, then select SHA256.  
  4. Hash Email Addresses Using Adobe Experience Platform Data Distiller: Email addresses can be hashed after ingesting raw email addresses into Adobe Experience Platform using Data Distiller. 

Hash Email Addresses Using Email Transformation in Real-Time CDP 

Raw email addresses can be uploaded into Adobe Experience Platform and hashed upon activation to destinations. When using Adobe Experience Platform for hashing emails, email addresses are hashed by the platform when exporting the data by using "Apply Transformation" checkmark. The hashing is performed using SHA-256 to convert the email addresses into a secure and non-reversible format. Adobe Experience Platform hashes email addresses during activation and doesn’t store these hashed emails as persistent attributes. Note that data from unhashed namespaces is automatically hashed by the platform during the activation. Attributes data is not automatically hashed, and you need to use “Apply Transformation” button. Note that the same hashing will be applied to a distinct email address when sending the email to multiple destinations. Ensure that your chosen destination accepts hashed email addresses and transformation during activation. 

Key Steps

  1. Select an audience for activation. 
  2. Follow the standard process of audience activation. 
  3. Once in the mapping stage of activating the audience, add new mappings by selecting specific email attributes that you need in the source and target fields. Next, check “Apply Transformation” option Activate the audience. 

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   4. Activate the audience. 

Upload Pre-hashed Email Addresses into Adobe Experience Platform 

Email addresses can be hashed before uploading them into Adobe Experience Platform - check the requirements for each destination before proceeding with this option to ensure that your chosen destination supports hashed email addresses.  

Key Steps: 

  1. Normalize your data before proceeding with email addresses hashing (ensure email addresses are cleaned and standardized). 
  2. Hash email addresses using SHA-256. Check the specific hashing requirements of your activation destination. 
  3. Ingest pre-hashed email addresses into Adobe Experience Platform using the appropriate data ingestion method. 
  4. Once in the audience activation process, map the hashed email attributes. 
  5. Activate the audience. 

Below are example requirements for some destinations when choosing to hash email addresses outside of Adobe Experience Platform. Note that each destination may have slightly different requirements, although all destinations require emails to be hashed using SHA256. 

Facebook:  

  • Trim all leading and trailing spaces from the email string; example: johndoe@example.com, not <space>johndoe@example.com<space>; 
  • When hashing the email strings, make sure to hash the lowercase string; 
  • Example: example@email.com, not EXAMPLE@EMAIL.COM; 
  • Ensure that the hashed string is all lowercase 
  • Example: 55e79200c1635b37ad31a378c39feb12f120f116625093a19bc32fff15041149, not 55E79200C1635B37AD31A378C39FEB12F120F116625093A19bC32FFF15041149; 
  • Do not salt the string. 

The Trade Desk: 

  • Remove leading and trailing spaces. 
  • Convert all ASCII characters to lowercase. 
  • In gmail.com email addresses, remove the following characters from the username part of the email address: 
  • The period (. (ASCII code 46)). For example, normalize jane.doe@gmail.com to janedoe@gmail.com. 
  • The plus sign (+ (ASCII code 43)) and all subsequent characters. For example, normalize janedoe+home@gmail.com to janedoe@gmail.com. 

Hash Email Addresses Using Calculated Fields in Real-Time CDP

Most file-based destinations don’t accept “Apply Transformation” feature in Real-Time CDP. If you still want to use Real-Time CDP hashing during activation to file-based destinations, you can use Calculated Fields feature and convert hashed email addresses to SHA256. It takes an input and produces a hashed value. Input requires the plain text to be hashed. Ensure that your chosen destination supports hashed email addresses and calculated fields.  

Key Steps: 

  1. Select an audience for activation. 
  2. Follow the standard process of the audience activation. 
  3. Once in the audience activation mapping stage, select “Add calculated fields”. 

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    4. Select SHA256 from the Function tab. 

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     5. Next, from the Field tab, select the specific email attribute you need into the brackets, for example: sha256(personalEmail.primary). Save.

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     6.  Back in the mapping step of the workflow, fill in the Target field with a value of the column header you want for this field in the exported files.

     7. Click next and activate the audience. 

Hash Email Addresses Using Data Distiller in Adobe Experience Platform

Email hashing using Data Distiller involves transforming email addresses into hashed values after data has been ingested into Adobe Experience Platform. Data Distiller is used to process the data by applying transformation such as email hashing before it is utilized for audience segmentation and activation. Ensure that your chosen destination supports hashed email addresses. 

Key Steps: 

  1. Normalize your data before proceeding with data ingestion (ensure email addresses are cleaned and standardized). 
  2. Ingest raw email addresses into Adobe Experience Platform through appropriate ingestion method.  
  3. Navigate to Queries in the Adobe Experience Platform. 
  4. Select “Create a Query” button. 
  5. Build a query to apply SHA256 email hashing transformation to the email field. 
  6. Run and test the query. 
  7. Apply the query to a Dataset. 
  8. Follow the standard process of the audience creation and activation. 
  9. Once in the audience activation mapping stage, map the required fields. 
  10. Activate the audience 

Summary 

All hashing methods ensure secure handling of email addresses and choosing between hashing emails within Adobe Experience Platform or uploading pre-hashed email addresses depends on the campaign specific needs and your data workflow.

Use Real-Time CDP email hashing transformation method when you need to securely hash emails in real-time as part of audience activation for advertising destinations. You can hash email addresses outside of Adobe Experience Platform when you want to pre-process data in your own environment before uploading it to Adobe Experience Platform. Real-Time CDP calculated fields email hashing transformation in file-based and other destinations works where no automatic transformation is available. Hashing email addresses using Data Distiller is a good option when you need to transform and store hashed email addresses as part of a broader data processing pipeline into secure hashed formats.