Yes, a gifter can cancel a gift subscription with a deferred start date before the activation without notifying the giftee about the gift. This means the giftee will never receive a gift delivery email or learn that a gift was intended.
More broadly, the gifter retains full subscription lifecycle management abilities, including:
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Toggling auto-renew on and off
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Renewing ahead of schedule
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Cancelling the subscription
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Updating the payment method
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Updating gift recipient details (until the gift is redeemed)
Once the gift has been redeemed, the gifter can still manage the subscription lifecycle but can no longer change the gift recipient details.
For more details, see the Gift subscription management section in Renewable gifting.