Re: Off Topic: E-Mail Security in this Group
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg117744] Re: Off Topic: E-Mail Security in this Group
- From: Helen Read <readhpr at gmail.com>
- Date: Wed, 30 Mar 2011 04:18:03 -0500 (EST)
- References: <imsh46$5hs$1@smc.vnet.net>
On 3/29/2011 7:51 AM, JCW wrote: > It appears that one's full e-mail address is exposed to the Internet > whenever one posts to this group because it is a 'Google front end' > for a Usenet group. (Oddly, Google gives me a warning to this effect > when I try to post a REPLY to an existing message, but NOT when I > start a new thread.) There's a nice discussion of this issue at > "Discussion>Google Groups Basics>security when using usenet groups" > that recommends, in particular, using disposable e-mail addresses (not > so easy when you already have a Google account). Yet I see a lot of > people using what are apparently real e-mail addresses (masked by > Google, of course) on this group. > > So my question is this: How have you folks solved this problem (if > indeed there is one) and avoided spammers? -- JCW I access this group via Usenet, using a real news server and news reader (not the web based Google Groups), because for me it's way more convenient. I have been a Usenet denizen since 1993, and have always posted under my real e-mail address so that people can reply directly to me if they like. There's nothing more annoying than replying to sender only to have the e-mail bounce because of a fake address. In the early days, there was some spam coming in as a result of spammers harvesting addresses from Usenet, but it was never a huge problem. Spammers now have so many other sources of e-mail addresses that having my e-mail address out there on Usenet doesn't matter. And any decent e-mail provider nowadays filters out e-mail spam, and I see little to no spam making it through to my Inbox. Really it's a non-issue, and my own belief is that people should post under a valid e-mail address so that others can reply directly to the sender. -- Helen Read University of Vermont