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HTML How to Make a Website Adding Pages to a Website Build the Contact Page

Mark Shiel
Mark Shiel
12,225 Points
Posted by Mark Shiel
Mark Shiel
12,225 Points

Is it considered a bad idea to use mailto: links like in this lesson, due to spam bots harvesting the email address?

When I was making web pages a few years ago, contact forms or using some form of javascript to attempt to hide the email address was used else the amount of spam that would come to this address would be impossible to deal with?

Is this still the norma? are direct mailto: links a bad idea?

Anain Roibal
Anain Roibal
4,532 Points
Anain Roibal
Anain Roibal
4,532 Points

It is not ideal, but you get more spam on your email by subscribing to crappy websites anyways.

2 Answers

Matt Trask
Matt Trask
10,027 Points
Matt Trask
Matt Trask
10,027 Points

Yea its not the greatest, but then again, if you have a low hitting site, you probably arent spam bot targets.

Carolyn Brade
Carolyn Brade
2,614 Points
Carolyn Brade
Carolyn Brade
2,614 Points

You could always use a throw away email address. I put in my hotmail account, cause after about 6 months of inactivity it erases the messages. If you have the patience you could list unique email or alias email for each contact site and if spam bot uses it too much change it. It used to be common to spell out the dot and /or other characters that weren't numbers or letters in the email address (i.e. UserName(at)domain(dot)com ), especially on chat boards. Have the spam bots figured the work around out yet?