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Ask HN: Is there a safe /dev/null for e-mail addresses?

1 pointsby WCityMikealmost 14 years ago
I hope this isn't a question out of place here. If so, my apologies in advance.<p>Is there an equivalent of /dev/null for e-mail addresses -- an address where, when you send it there, you can be assured that it goes into nothingness?<p>An additional (and perhaps essential) criteria would be it not being an address where a third party could redirect the "/dev/null"-iness of it into a normal, saving e-mail address.<p>This would not be on a mail server I would have any control or configuration over; in fact, I'd be using the address from Gmail.<p>I did recently purchase a domain name, so perhaps could do something along those lines, but I'm afraid I must admit to slight n00bishness when it comes to what one can do with mail redirection and URL redirection.<p>If it doesn't or can't exist, fair enough -- but thought I would inquire and I figured if it did exist, it'd be known by someone on here.<p>Thanks!

3 comments

patio11almost 14 years ago
anything@example.{com,org,net} will <i>probably</i> work for your purpose, if you just want an email where you can send stuff to without annoying a real person.<p>You should not assume that something sent to one of them would be non-recoverable. (That is a poor assumption for email in general, due to how SMTP works. Basically, everybody "between" sender and recipient gets to see everything, and "between" can be a very, very scary place. You get no guarantees as to the policies of the people who compromise "between.")
sixtofouralmost 14 years ago
<a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2606" rel="nofollow">http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2606</a> provides a number of test/example TLDs and second level domain names.<p>I just sent email from gmail to devnull@example.com, without an immediate bounce.<p>I don't know if this is considered rude or benign, nor whether it satisfies your need. I also don't know what happens to anything sent there: storage, logs, etc.
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WCityMikealmost 14 years ago
Thank you -- I appreciate both your answers!