Disposable email address

APINC provides a disposable email service at jetable.org. Give them your real email address (they promise not to sell it), and pick a time period (24/48 hours or 4/6/8 days) and they’ll create an email address that expires after that amount of time.

So, somebody you’re not sure about needs your email address? Give ’em one of these. If they sell it to spammers, no problem, the name will expire soon.

Be careful…in most email programs, if you reply to an email someone sends to the temporary address, your real address will go out in the from or sender field.

Depending on your ISP, there are a few do-it-yourself temporary address tricks you can use. If your address is somebody@example.com, then the addresses somebody-anything@example.com or somebody(anything)@example.com might work. Test each, and see if any of them work for you.

Then, if MrSpammer wants your email address, give them somebody-MrSpammer@example.com. If you start getting spam, you know MrSpammer really is a spammer, or sold your address to a spammer. So set your email program to filter that address straight to trash.

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