On Fri, 4 Jun 2004 17:41:32 +1000, Alan Harrison wrote: > Mark is quite correct when he says that complex e-mail harvesters will > probably work around these methods, but it appears that most of the > harvesting is done by very basic programs that are looking only for e-mail > addresses stored in conventional format.
Assuming true intelligence on the part of a spammer is probably going too far, but it does occur to me that it is in the interests of spammers not to try too hard to collect addresses. By only collecting the most easily found addresses (ie the un-obfuscated ones) they: 1) still get many millions of addresses to use and 2) are less likely to reach the group that will report them. But that sort of thinking assumes sensible reasoning on the part of the spammer. :) FTR - I've had great success with minimising spam with simple replacement with character entities. Note that I also hide the 'mailto:' part. Lea -- Lea de Groot Elysian Systems - I Understand the Internet <http://elysiansystems.com/> Web Design, Usability, Information Architecture, Search Engine Optimisation Brisbane, Australia ***************************************************** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list & getting help *****************************************************
