Slashdot Mirror
Hotmail Launches Accounts You Can Throw Away
suraj.sun writes with this excerpt from CNET: "Today, Hotmail is getting a new feature aimed at 'e-mail enthusiasts,' which lets anyone create multiple e-mail accounts that can be read, replied to, and managed from their everyday e-mail inbox. These additional e-mail addresses can be had in the same manner as signing up for new accounts, but they require no extra log-ins or upkeep. ... The idea is to give users a safe way to provide third parties with an e-mail address, without giving up the address they've provided to family and friends, which, if compromised, can end the usefulness of that particular account. Each user will be able to create up to five aliases, any of which can be deleted and replaced with another at any time. Over time, Microsoft will increase that limit to 15 aliases per account, making it so that the true heavy users won't need to juggle between two or more Hotmail accounts."
I've used it elsewhere but integrated into a client like hotmail is a good idea. Besides, I already use hotmail for my spam address. Now Google, steal this please.
Tiger Blooded Bi-Winning Machine
this is the first time I've seen a Microsoft focused article after the /. redesign. Bill as Borg doesn't seem right - he's not even in charge any more. Where's Ballmer with a chair (and not sitting on it)?
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=69570
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
Isn't that what people do with their hotmail account anyway? Throw it away?
Now we're going to be emailing grandmacatherineandgrandpajohn1320924delta@hotmail.com
I've been doing a similar thing with my own domain / webserver for the last decade. I'll make up email addresses right on the spot, usually like "slashdot.org@mydomain.com" or "sprint@mydomain.com", etc. I have a catch all account that receives all emails to non-existent accounts, and I can split any of the addresses off into an actual account whenever needed (or disable it if it becomes inundated with spam). That was always one of the big perks of owning your own domain.
Better known as 318230.
This seems pretty similar to Gmail's aliasing - append anything after a plus sign to your email address (ex firehed+slashdot@gmail.com) and it goes to your main inbox. If that address is compromised, just filter anything addressed to that account.
Microsoft seems to have a few advantages here, though. First, it's a lot more seamless. Second, there are tons of websites that incorrectly validate email addresses and treat + as an illegal character, which it is not (hell, you can go directly to an IP address instead of a domain, although nobody ever would), so by extension it's harder to use as a throw-away address. And third, it's pretty obvious you've done it, and websites can just s/\+[A-z0-9.-]+@gmail.com/@gmail.com/g it into oblivion.
Of course, in order to get this functionality, you need to use hotmail. Aren't those already throw-away accounts by definition?
How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
Gmail has something that's arguably better -- you can use a plus sign to append any string you like to your address, so you can have "myname@gmail.com' as your main account and give "myname+family@gmail.com" to your family. And when you sign up for a Hormel mailling list, you can use "myname+hormel@gmail.com" so you know when you're getting spammed by Hormel.
I threw away my hotmail account 10 years ago.