Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses • Hacker News Board

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#101

Post by wnevets » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 4:29 PM UTC

Santosh83 wrote: post #6

I have been getting financial emails from several people for many years at my GMail ID. They apparently have given my address but without the dot. But what mystifies me is how these people keep going for years without ever realising they aren't getting account transaction emails (from their banks), notifications of stock trades, even OTP emails etc. How is it possible for people to use these services for years withou…

I had someone open a bank account with my email and I called the bank thinking someone was stealing my ID or something. How do people not know their own email address?

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#102

Post by jeffbee » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 4:29 PM UTC

hathym wrote: post #36

not 100% true, gmail won't allow you to send to john....smith@gmail for example

That's got more to do with gmail's composer than with their mailer. "foo + bar@baz"@domain.net is a valid email address but gmail won't permit you to type it in.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#103

Post by wayanon » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 4:31 PM UTC

I got an email from Australia with the appointment for my spousal visa application, I'm also apparently looking for a new BMW in Cape Town and I also have a partner I visit in Paris and we order Chicken McNuggets on Uber Eats.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#104

Post by kevin_thibedeau » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 4:31 PM UTC

Spivak wrote: post #70

tialaramex wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

James is wrong, this is Netflix's fault. The same "scam" would work under a variety of circumstances because Netflix relies on something it has no reason to believe is true. Maybe you signed up to Netflix but your house mate thinks she did, she gets an email because of Eve, now you're both paying for Netflix, but actually she's paying for Eve's account. Netflix could make this mistake with postal addresses even, if f…

This is actually Google's fault. Because Google is large enough Netflix could be nice and have special handling for Gmail addresses but this would be going against the email RFC that says $inbox1+$subaddr@domain == $inbox2+$subaddr@domain iff $inbox1 and $inbox2 are identical . Netflix has zero idea how any particular email operator mangles or maps inboxes to actual users. Apple's private email service maps all sorts…

There is no RFC specifying the interpretation of address formats. Every domain can use whatever scheme they wish. The RFC only declares that senders can't impose additional formatting rules on receivers.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#105

Post by wkalt » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 4:32 PM UTC

If someone emails you without a dot and you reply from your dotted address, it will look strange in the receiver's email client.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#106

Post by coredog64 » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 4:34 PM UTC

Santosh83 wrote: post #6

I have been getting financial emails from several people for many years at my GMail ID. They apparently have given my address but without the dot. But what mystifies me is how these people keep going for years without ever realising they aren't getting account transaction emails (from their banks), notifications of stock trades, even OTP emails etc. How is it possible for people to use these services for years withou…

Same, but my concern is that some day one of these people will convince Google support that they own my account and then I will really be hosed.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#107

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 4:34 PM UTC

moviuro wrote: post #38

pricechild wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> providers/servers should ignore everything from the + to the @ Why? I'm not sure it has ever been a standard and it's certainly not a default implementation for most providers?

A quick google search returns https://www.cs.rutgers.edu/~watrous/plus-signs-in-email-addr... . Although not standard, its use is "legal"

[deleted]

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#108

Post by jcranmer » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 4:34 PM UTC

Spivak wrote: post #81

teddyh wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope, the + trick is not standardized. The RFCs only specify that everything before the @ character is specific to the recipient system and Should Not Be Messed With ; even case-folding that part of an e-mail address is a no-no, since the recipient system might distinguish case, and the sender has no way of knowing. The + trick arose later, as a feature of certain mail recipient programs like Sendmail and Postfix, an…

Subaddressing or "plus addressing" is a standard defined in RFC5223.

Note that RFC5233 doesn't actually standardize the delimiter. It uses "+" "#" and "--" in examples.

All RFC5233 does is specify how sieve (a protocol for specifying server-side email filters) can describe filtering on subaddresses. It does not confer any actual interpretation on email addresses, especially since many email providers don't actually use sieve for their email filters.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#109

Post by runxel » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 4:37 PM UTC

There is also the alias of googlemail.com on the domain level... Always a cause of big headaches.

  johnsmith@gmail.com
  john.smith@gmail.com
  johnsm.ith+foobar@gmail.com
  j.oh.nsmith@googlemail.com

all are pointing to the same logical email address.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#110

Post by jcranmer » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 4:38 PM UTC

hathym wrote: post #36

not 100% true, gmail won't allow you to send to john....smith@gmail for example

john.....smith@gmail.com is not a legal email address: the local-part is a dot-atom (or quoted-string) production, so successive dots are not legal outside of a quoted string.