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There have been several recent new CWDF members that have signed up making their user names the same as their email addresses. Most change it to something more anonymous after the down sides of doing this are pointed out, but it puts them at risk of being spammed, if nothing else. Can we have a warning in the sign-up page not to do this and why? Ideal would be a ban on the @ character in the user name field of the form, but I've no idea how hard that would be to arrange.

Jen@oopsIjustgavemyemailaddesstotheentireplanet.com

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It's an interesting idea, Jen, thank you. It does occur to me that most new members will also be members of other web sites or groups and have probably used the same name elsewhere, so why not here?

   As you may know, I am far from being an internet boffin; but I don't really see what harm is done by posting one's e-mail address on here.

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23 minutes ago, Athy said:

It's an interesting idea, Jen, thank you. It does occur to me that most new members will also be members of other web sites or groups and have probably used the same name elsewhere, so why not here?

   As you may know, I am far from being an internet boffin; but I don't really see what harm is done by posting one's e-mail address on here.

Usual practice for most forums, web sites and so on, where the info is going to be public, is not to have peoples email addresses visible to the planet. I can't remember any off hand that would display an email address for the entire world to see, rather than just logged in members in good standing. Less of a problem than it used to be, but anyone who does do it is going to get spam email in huge quantities. Increased exposure if someone decides to go all stalker on you. Many reasons why it is a bad idea.

Jen

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25 minutes ago, Athy said:

It's an interesting idea, Jen, thank you. It does occur to me that most new members will also be members of other web sites or groups and have probably used the same name elsewhere, so why not here?

   As you may know, I am far from being an internet boffin; but I don't really see what harm is done by posting one's e-mail address on here.

you mean apart from what op already mentioned? I cant think of any.

32 minutes ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:

There have been several recent new CWDF members that have signed up making their user names the same as their email addresses. Most change it to something more anonymous after the down sides of doing this are pointed out, but it puts them at risk of being spammed, if nothing else. Can we have a warning in the sign-up page not to do this and why? Ideal would be a ban on the @ character in the user name field of the form, but I've no idea how hard that would be to arrange.

Jen@oopsIjustgavemyemailaddesstotheentireplanet.com

 

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1 hour ago, Athy said:

   As you may know, I am far from being an internet boffin; but I don't really see what harm is done by posting one's e-mail address on here.

My other half was on a Rootsweb email group a few years ago.

 

She had 11000 spam emails waiting for her in one day!

 

She still receives the odd few, even now.

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Spam from email addresses posted on the web is a problem from 10 years ago. It isn't really an issue now.

 

There are so many leaked user databases around (check haveibeenpwned.com to see if your address is on one) that no spammer is going to go through the hassle of crawling the web. Email providers' spam detection is also vastly better than it used to be, particularly if you use one of the big providers.

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On 05/12/2020 at 17:13, Richard Fairhurst said:

Spam from email addresses posted on the web is a problem from 10 years ago. It isn't really an issue now.

I could well imagine this is true.

 

However there are also plenty of other reasons you wouldnt want to do it!

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On 04/12/2020 at 17:28, Jen-in-Wellies said:

There have been several recent new CWDF members that have signed up making their user names the same as their email addresses. Most change it to something more anonymous after the down sides of doing this are pointed out, but it puts them at risk of being spammed, if nothing else. Can we have a warning in the sign-up page not to do this and why? Ideal would be a ban on the @ character in the user name field of the form, but I've no idea how hard that would be to arrange.

Jen@oopsIjustgavemyemailaddesstotheentireplanet.com

I will have a look into why that might be.

 

We have 141 members with and '@' sign in their username currently, reasonable number are not in the format of an email address, but fair a selection are. Of which some are much older members, however some are newer and it does appear to be slightly more frequently lately. 

 

Daniel

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30 minutes ago, DHutch said:

I will have a look into why that might be.

 

We have 141 members with and '@' sign in their username currently, reasonable number are not in the format of an email address, but fair a selection are. Of which some are much older members, however some are newer and it does appear to be slightly more frequently lately. 

 

Daniel

Even just a note on the sign up page not to do it would help.

Jen

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13 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

 

Probably the "Sign in with Google/Facebook/Microsoft" buttons.

Yes, I expect it is one of the, which presumably pre-populates the field.

 

I know one of the people affect so might be able to work it out, and or will do some testing.

 

 

Daniel

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