More ways to use disposable addresses
By Brian Livingston
I described in the
Mar. 30
newsletter how to use "disposable" e-mail addresses. These are
unique addresses that you give to Web sites and other
people who want to send you mail. If they happen to reveal your address to spammers,
you simply turn off that one address rather than trying to filter out a wave
of spam.
My readers, it turns out, have a lot of ideas about using disposable addresses.
Follow along with me as we hear about some great tricks, many of which cost little
or nothing.
How to get Yahoo AddressGuard for free
In my article, I recommended Yahoo.com's
AddressGuard feature. This gives you a private Yahoo.com e-mail address, which
you never give out. You then can invent up to 500 disposable addresses. Yahoo
puts them into your main e-mail account, which remains safe from spam because
it's not exposed to your correspondents.
Several readers provides additional tips about this, including ways to get
AddressGuard without paying the nominal fee for Yahoo Mail Plus. Larry Huisingh
writes:
-
"I read your latest newsletter in which you mentioned
Yahoo!'s $19.99 per year Yahoo Mail Plus, which includes a 500-address version
of their AddressGuard service.
"I have recently switched to Verizon as my DSL ISP, and I keep being told that they have a Yahoo! package they would love for me to use (or optionally, an MSN one).
"After a chat session with one of Verizon/Yahoo's support people, I learned that if you take advantage of the combined Verizon/Yahoo! package (for no extra charge) you can get a 50-address version of AddressGuard. So, it may not be a 500-address package, but at least it's free!"
-
"If you have SBC/Yahoo (quickly becomming ATT/Yahoo) DSL service, you get this free.
Another feature is that you can color code the inbox based on which sub account was
used, so things you consider important will be highlighted.
"While I have set up one spam account, I haven't really been able to completely try out the system. I believe that color-coding stuff only works for Webmail, not POP3 or anything else that actually downloads the messages."
This may be why some other readers reported that they didn't have to pay anything to get a Yahoo account that supports disposables. Peter Hodge writes:
-
"I just thought I would mention that Yahoo provides the AddressGuard feature on free
mail accounts as well (mine, at least). The Yahoo Mail Plus page is incorrect in its
feature comparison.
"Interestly, there is no mention of Mail Plus anywhere inside a free account. I thought they had dropped the service altogether, because I couldn't find a mention of it anywhere on the site."
Yahoo is even cheaper if you live in India
A reader in Mumbai, India, named Khushnood Viccaji writes that he gets a fantastic deal on AddressGuard:
-
"You mentioned in your recent newsletter article that Yahoo offers disposable e-mail
addresses only to subscribers of their Mail Plus service (19.95 USD).
"I am a free account user — and this service is available to me! I have been using disposable addresses since the past 6 months now."
A very enthusiastic reader who goes by the name of Elijah provides some advice about managing disposable addresses that applies to any of them, not just the ones supported by Yahoo:
-
"I looooooove your article on disposable e-mail addresses!!!
"Like you, I looooooove Yahoo disposable e-mail addresses also!
"A tip about the Yahoo disposable e-mail addresses: When creating keywords, you can actually key in a short comment to note whom you created that disposable address for. That way, you don't always have to use the brand of the company you are giving the e-mail address to as a keyword...
"I key in a number (or today's date) when creating a keyword, e.g., amazon20060401. This way, not only can I prevent guessing of keywords, but I can also track when this keyword has been created and if I want to delete it after some time."
Many people followed up on my description of free disposable addresses that are available if you manage your own domain name. People often don't wish to deal with registering a domain of their own, but it does give you a great deal of control.
Phil Smith III describes how to get this going, if you don't have a moniker of your own already:
-
"I'm confused by all the fooferaw about disposable e-mail addresses. For the cost of a
domain — typicaly less than $20/year — you can have unlimited e-mail addresses
without having to administer a server.
"Domain registrars, such as BuyDomains.com, offer e-mail (and URL!) forwarding for free, with blackhole (blocking) capability. We've used this for years, and have blackholed a number of hacked/sold addresses (including addresses given to United Airlines and JCPenney).
"You simply specify a global forward, then add the blackholes, as needed, as exceptions. The mail comes to the mailbox of our choice at our ISP, and the headers include the original target address, so mail filters can route notes appropriately, if you want to get that fancy. (I do — I route list mail, eBay mail, and several other categories into separate mailboxes or Outlook categories.) URL forwarding means that if your ISP offers some hosting space, it can be reached at www.ourdomain.com rather than something like users.isp.com/~username.
"As an added benefit, we have permanent email addresses — our ISP has changed several times, but our correspondents haven't had to make any changes, since our addresses@ourdomain haven't changed.
"Administration of the forwarding is via a Web-based console, and it's painless. We have no limits on namespace available, no worries about plus signs and the like, and so It Just Works.
"I always enjoy your column."
The readers quoted above will receive a gift certificate for a book, CD, or DVD of their choice for sending comments that I printed.
To send me a tip on any other subject, visit WindowsSecrets.com/contact. Thanks in advance!
Brian Livingston is editor of the Windows Secrets Newsletter and the coauthor of Windows 2000 Secrets, Windows Me Secrets, and eight other books.
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