Re: certification database and privacy

[Faber Fedor]

At 03:09 PM 8/29/99 -0400, Evan Leibovitch wrote:
>On Tue, 24 Aug 1999, Faber Fedor wrote:
>
>> I have always liked the idea of using an email address as the unique
>> identifier, since that *has* to be unique, no?

I guess I should have phrased that as "...since it *has* to be unique in
the email name space, no?"

>No, not really:
>- as a person changes jobs, professional email destinations come and go
>- personal email addresses can change as someone changes ISPs, or
>  comes and goes from services such as hotmail

Neither of these changes the uniqueness of the new email address
identifying the user.

>- Some services which use aliases or euphamisms, could re-use them if
>  someone leaves. Let's say someone's on AOL and got the mail alias of
>  [EMAIL PROTECTED] Once this person leaves AOL, the company is totally
>  within its rights to assign the alias to someone else the next day.

So far, this is the one and only reasonable argument against using email
addresses.

>- Some people have multiple email addresses; I think I have five or so.

So?  Since I have an email account of [EMAIL PROTECTED], does that mean
[EMAIL PROTECTED] does not uniquely identify me?

Anyway, the point is moot, because I think we're going with a generated
UID, right?





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