As the others said, this likely has nothing to do with Apple. The government email address was likely handed to Apple at some point while shopping — my guess is during the “add to bag” process, probably due to it being saved somewhere in Chrome’s settings (since it’s Chrome, and not Microsoft’s browser).
I’m not sure it would be considered a breach of privacy — you’d have to read Apple’s statements about privacy. In general terms, though, email addresses are not in any way private. They are meant to be shared, and as @WayneG said, your email address is on every server you’ve ever sent email through and on every individual’s computer/device that you’ve corresponded with, and any online backup services that those computers use, etc.
And if the email address was shared through Chrome’s mechanism, then it’s Google that is at fault, not Apple. This wouldn’t surprise me at all, and it’s one reason why I don’t use Chrome unless I have no other choice.
However, I agree that it’s a bit spooky!
I’d like to know if in Chrome you were logged into your Apple ID when you shopped and placed the items in your bag. And when you later purchased them on an Apple device, were you logged into your Apple ID? If you were using a web browser on an Apple device, that would mean you were logged into your Apple ID in the web browser when you connected to Apple’s web site (even when using a browser on an iPhone, for example, it’s an additional step to log in). If you were using the Apple Store app on an iPhone/iPad, you likely were logged into your Apple ID (though I think it’s possible to log out).
If you were logged in everywhere throughout the process, I would expect that your Apple ID email address would receive the notifications.
But if you were logged out of your Apple ID when you later made the purchase in Safari on a Mac, then I wouldn’t be surprised if it grabbed the work email address. I know that I have frequently made purchases in Safari on my Mac without being logged in (you don’t get prompted to log in when buying), and those purchases are not “associated” with my Apple ID. My Mac was logged into my Apple ID, but I was not logged into Apple’s web server via the browser.
Also, this is assuming that you made the purchase from the “bag” you created on your work machine. If you abandoned the full bag on your Windows machine and then purchased on your Apple device starting from a new, empty bag, (to which you added the products that you previously looked at), then I would be surprised if the sales confirmation was linked to your work email address. However, if your Apple device was on the same network as your work device when you made the purchase, and especially if you also weren’t logged in at the time, then your work email address could be linked.
It’s a complicated business, as you can see.
It is possible to tell Apple that those purchases should be associated with your Apple ID. Perhaps that wasn’t done in your case when you talked to Apple support, which is why the work email address was again used regarding this purchase. Or, if the next email was not related to the purchase email, then the initial purchase triggered being added to one of Apple’s mailing lists. In that case, a simple unsubscribe on your part should stop it.
Final note: I suspect that this sharing of email addresses isn’t nefarious. It’s more likely due to the programmers wanting to make e-commerce work easily and reliably for consumers (and the companies and payment processors), hence linking a potential purchase to an email address.
…