> Rick Lecoat > To join with Andrew Maben, however, I'd be curious to know whether > spambots decode encoded entity text, eg: > > 'user' > becomes > 'user' > > (ignore quote marks). > > > I assume that they can read them perfectly easily -- browsers > can, after > all -- but it'd be good to know for sure. > Same question for screen readers.
All that would take for a spambot is to do a two-pass: replace all encoded entities, then scan the result for email-address-like patterns. Trivial. And once an email address is harvested by one bot, it's likely to end up on lists that are then sold and shared around...so even if not all spambots will bother with a two-pass, it's not a safe way to go about things...and I'd say it's more trouble than it's worth (makes editing the page a pain for non-techie users, for instance). P ________________________________ Patrick H. Lauke Web Editor Enterprise & Development University of Salford Room 113, Faraday House Salford, Greater Manchester M5 4WT UK T +44 (0) 161 295 4779 [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.salford.ac.uk A GREATER MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY ******************************************************************* List Guidelines: http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm Unsubscribe: http://webstandardsgroup.org/join/unsubscribe.cfm Help: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *******************************************************************
