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Microsoft adding support for custom '+' email addresses in Office 365

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Re: Microsoft adding support for custom '+' email addresses in Office 365

#21
post #5

FastMail had some of the cleverest ideas for plus addressing. username+tag@fastmail.fm could be given away as tag@username.fastmail.fm

I used this for a few sites, but then stopped as I realized this would be a pain to change if I ever wanted to change to a different email provider. Wish every provider would support this as I’m sure spammers have caught on to the plus addressing scheme.

[deleted]

Re: Microsoft adding support for custom '+' email addresses in Office 365

#24
post #5

FastMail had some of the cleverest ideas for plus addressing. username+tag@fastmail.fm could be given away as tag@username.fastmail.fm

I used this for a few sites, but then stopped as I realized this would be a pain to change if I ever wanted to change to a different email provider. Wish every provider would support this as I’m sure spammers have caught on to the plus addressing scheme.

The majority of spam [that gets past various RBLs] that I receive is completely ignorant of the dash addressing that I use. It's exactly the same as plus addressing but with a dash instead of a plus.

Pharma spam, 419 scams, password leak crypto blackmail... remember that these miscreants rely on low costs to achieve their profits, so any sort of filtering is too expensive. They don't even filter out abuse@, postmaster@, hostmaster@, or mailer-daemon@.

Re: Microsoft adding support for custom '+' email addresses in Office 365

#25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would agree with this technique, but it’s not possible due to the high number of services that don’t permit “+” in the email address or break because they don’t URI encode it. I have several services I will never be able to unsubscribe from because of the latter—and yes, I tried manually URI encoding it and changing the form fields with dev tools.

Such services are likely breaking the law. Edit: Downvote me all you want, they're still breaking the law… In the US there's the CAN-SPAM act ( https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center/guidance/can... ) and nearly every other country has similar laws. Most of them require one-click unsubscribes to work. It's still failure to comply even if it's due to negligence/ignorance/incompetence.

How exactly should I go about dealing with Universal Pictures Home Entertainment under the CAN-SPAM Act?

Individuals cannot sue under CAN-SPAM Act and I don't think any state Attorney General is going to bring a suit on my behalf because they didn't accommodate a plus alias.

Re: Microsoft adding support for custom '+' email addresses in Office 365

#26
post #5

FastMail had some of the cleverest ideas for plus addressing. username+tag@fastmail.fm could be given away as tag@username.fastmail.fm

I really wish FastMail would add an option to use a minus instead of a plus since most forms properly handle minuses, but many do not properly handle pluses.

Re: Microsoft adding support for custom '+' email addresses in Office 365

#27

Finally. This has only been allowed since RFC 822 (1982). Is there any reason why Microsoft did not support this from the beginning (of Exchange)?

I've been using "Microsoft 365" since 2012, outlook w/ a custom domain and all the grandfathered features. The +tag has always been supported, and I can't really tell what the difference between "Office 365" and "Microsoft 365" is, since the latter appears to include the former, if not identical.

Re: Microsoft adding support for custom '+' email addresses in Office 365

#28

I understand the appeal of this feature for sorting, but it seems ineffective for things like "figure out who sold my email to the spammers" because everyone knows about it and it's elementary to just trim off everything after the plus sign. Unless you do some kind of verification and filter email sent to addresses without a valid suffix?

Since I have my own domain, I receive all emails addressed at whatever@domain.com. Of course, different values of "whatever" end up in different directories, and should one of those display an insufficient SNR, it would go straight to /dev/null. This way the "proper" address, i.e., the one that goes to the actual inbox, is not easy to extract. The hard part is social acceptance. This morning the Whirpool technician w…

I have the same setup, with not very many different directories (most just comes to my inbox), since my email load is pretty manageable. I find the most spam by far comes from an address checked in to a public git repo, with my actual (public) github email a distant second and everything else pretty much nil.

The only non-public email so far that has resulted in a lot of spam was the one I gave to the animal shelter when I adopted my cat. (I count unsolicited advertisements as spam.)

Re: Microsoft adding support for custom '+' email addresses in Office 365

#29

Finally. This has only been allowed since RFC 822 (1982). Is there any reason why Microsoft did not support this from the beginning (of Exchange)?

Exchange was originally an X.400-based groupware system, SMTP support was somewhat of an afterthought. Exchange has a long history of not implementing SMTP properly with protocol violations and proprietary payloads (TNEF) and headers (e.g. Thread-Index)

Re: Microsoft adding support for custom '+' email addresses in Office 365

#30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such services are likely breaking the law. Edit: Downvote me all you want, they're still breaking the law… In the US there's the CAN-SPAM act ( https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center/guidance/can... ) and nearly every other country has similar laws. Most of them require one-click unsubscribes to work. It's still failure to comply even if it's due to negligence/ignorance/incompetence.

How exactly should I go about dealing with Universal Pictures Home Entertainment under the CAN-SPAM Act? Individuals cannot sue under CAN-SPAM Act and I don't think any state Attorney General is going to bring a suit on my behalf because they didn't accommodate a plus alias.

Little of consequence most likely, but in the USA the route would be an fcc complaint I believe.

https://consumercomplaints.fcc.gov/hc/en-us

The technical details as to why they are failing to unsubscribe you does not matter at all. What matters is, you've unsubscribed repeatedly and they are failing to register your intent.

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