Show HN: Find any email address on the web
1–10 of 25 posts
Re: Show HN: Find any email address on the web
#2It's an interesting idea, I'll say that much. A way to find email addresses associated with a certain domain is a pretty neat thing to have.
That said, isn't this a spam nightmare waiting to happen? I mean, if you give a spammer or two hundred access to this site, then all hell is gonna break loose (especially with popular websites that spammers and scumbags might want emails associated with).
And with your crawler taking email addresses from blogs, articles, comments and other such sources, it seems like this is a doxing tool just waiting to be used. It's not uncommon for people to post email addresses associated with those they don't like on a personal level, especially if they're in the middle of a large controversy (like say, the recent US elections).
I really hope you've figured out a way to avoid that side. And considered adding a way for sites to opt out (either on a domain level or an individual email address level).
Re: Show HN: Find any email address on the web
#3This seems like an incredibly unethical tool on first glance.
Re: Show HN: Find any email address on the web
#4It's an interesting idea, I'll say that much. A way to find email addresses associated with a certain domain is a pretty neat thing to have. That said, isn't this a spam nightmare waiting to happen? I mean, if you give a spammer or two hundred access to this site, then all hell is gonna break loose (especially with popular websites that spammers and scumbags might want emails associated with). And with your crawler t…
Thank you!
For spammers specifically, you're correct in that our service could possibly be used to gather emails by someone with the intention of spamming. This is true though really for any lead generation type service.
While we will be offering a free plan level, it will be very limited in terms of the number of emails you can find. In order to get more requests, there will be paid monthly plans. To be honest, the crawler part of our service is something sophisticated spammers have probably been doing for awhile now, and wouldn't see the benefit of paying for, for their specific uses.
With regards to the privacy concern, our crawler only finds emails that have been publicly posted. It also follows the standard rules expected of web crawlers today. For users to find emails, they must do so by a specific domain name, so for instance you couldn't just search for John Doe and find a Gmail address.
Re: Show HN: Find any email address on the web
#5So you have a tool to find emails, something that scammers and spammers may use, and the first thing you ask on your website is for my email address?! How trustful is that?
Re: Show HN: Find any email address on the web
#6It's an interesting idea, I'll say that much. A way to find email addresses associated with a certain domain is a pretty neat thing to have. That said, isn't this a spam nightmare waiting to happen? I mean, if you give a spammer or two hundred access to this site, then all hell is gonna break loose (especially with popular websites that spammers and scumbags might want emails associated with). And with your crawler t…
Thank you! For spammers specifically, you're correct in that our service could possibly be used to gather emails by someone with the intention of spamming. This is true though really for any lead generation type service. While we will be offering a free plan level, it will be very limited in terms of the number of emails you can find. In order to get more requests, there will be paid monthly plans. To be honest, the…
So you've taken something that only companies with large budgets were able to do, and made it possible for everyone?
Any way I can remove my email from your website in case a website I've signed up to hasn't hidden my email sufficiently?
What robots.txt rules do I add to protect my users in case emails get posted to my site in comments/posts?
Re: Show HN: Find any email address on the web
#7It's an interesting idea, I'll say that much. A way to find email addresses associated with a certain domain is a pretty neat thing to have. That said, isn't this a spam nightmare waiting to happen? I mean, if you give a spammer or two hundred access to this site, then all hell is gonna break loose (especially with popular websites that spammers and scumbags might want emails associated with). And with your crawler t…
Thank you! For spammers specifically, you're correct in that our service could possibly be used to gather emails by someone with the intention of spamming. This is true though really for any lead generation type service. While we will be offering a free plan level, it will be very limited in terms of the number of emails you can find. In order to get more requests, there will be paid monthly plans. To be honest, the…
Talking of Gmail, what are you going to do about those services?
Because letting people find emails associated with the gmail or yahoo domain would theoretically give you millions of results. Do you plan to delist any webmail service related domains?
And do you have any idea what to do if someone complains that their email isn't public but someone else has been posting it online (say, to let people attack them)?
Re: Show HN: Find any email address on the web
#8So you have a tool to find emails, something that scammers and spammers may use, and the first thing you ask on your website is for my email address?! How trustful is that?
We only track emails that have been publicly posted on the web.
Using emails that have been submitted to us through our signup form would obviously be a huge violation of privacy. We don't do this, and we never will.
You can view our privacy policy here https://maildb.io/privacy
Re: Show HN: Find any email address on the web
#9I disagree with the premise where time spent finding an email is wasted time. Personal control over the privacy of one's email is exactly what makes email valuable.
This is true for both sender and receiver because: Larger inbox load means less time/mental energy per message which in turn means lower value per message.
It's like the reverse of a network effect: the more users you have spamming people, the less valuable those emails become.
Re: Show HN: Find any email address on the web
#10You can already do this in Bing with the + modifier