Table of contents
Gmail Activity
Gmail activity gives visibility into outgoing email work without accessing message content. Because Google does not expose email through Workspace audit API, WorkSights receives email signals through a secure forwarding rule that sends header metadata for sent messages only.
For setup steps, see Gmail Forwarding.
What WorkSights Receives
WorkSights captures header metadata for outgoing emails: sender and recipient addresses, To, CC, and BCC fields, subject line, timestamp, and attachment names. Message bodies, attachments, drafts, incoming email, and labels are never received.
Only emails sent after the forwarding rule is enabled appear. There is no historical email backfill.
How Gmail Activity Appears
Each outgoing email appears as a small entry on the timeline, with the subject line as the title, in the Email category. Duration defaults to a short estimate for outbound communication.
If a subject line contains all-caps SENSITIVE, PRIVATE, or CONFIDENTIAL markers, WorkSights sets that activity to private. It is masked in the interface and excluded from summaries and AI features.
Troubleshooting
Gmail activity is not appearing
Confirm the forwarding rule has been configured in the Google Admin Console. Email activity will not appear without it. This is a forwarding-rule setup issue, not a connection issue, so reconnecting Google will not resolve it.
A specific user’s email is missing
Confirm the user is included in the forwarding configuration and that their sending address matches their mapped WorkSights user.
Only some email appears
The rule captures outgoing mail only, and only mail sent after the rule was enabled. Incoming email and historical email are never processed.