Heads-up, stop using email as a user-id in your systems. netikras@gmail.com and net.ikras@gmail.com are the same recipient. And noone really checks for that dot when validating a new user in our systems, do we? :)

Is that the same for all email servers or only Google?

The subway next door gave a half sub free per emailaccount while ordening. We used my catch all email for months!

@retoor I only know of google mail doing this.

Don't see this as a problem at all. Using an email address as user ID never guaranteed that the same person can only have one account. Only numbers/handles tied to government issued ID can do that given that only a single country system is used or linked to detect people with multiple nationalities.

With Email one can validate that the entered id is at least at some point owned by the user and can be used to contact in case of recovery. Also prevents creating accidental duplicate accounts for most normal users.

You also create infinite amount of unique emails by using a “+”

Netikras+uuid@gmail.com = netikras@gmail.com

@fckIE yeah those are way more useful unfortunately there are still a lot of shitty validations out there that don't allow for a "+" in the address.

I use it a lot to track how my data got leaked. Was especially nice to see with mandatory COVID registration when visiting a watering or feeding hole. They where supposed to destroy the data after a month and may not use the data for marketing. I still get offers with the +covid alias 🖕🖕🖕

@hjk101 I used to do that as well. I have now moved on to Apple’s hide my email for this stuff. I just deactivate the emails after giving it to services like these and re enable when needed.

Heads-up, stop preventing your users from developing their own workflows. If you absolutely need every user to be unique, ask for ID or issue invites centrally. Otherwise assume that a person can have several accounts.

That being said, the e-mail address should be modifiable so I agree that it shouldn't be used as a unique identifier.

@hjk101 phone number validation works quite well for limiting the amount of accounts. Not to just one but to a few. That's why the likes of Google use it, and it has become a de facto global ID number.

Bro this is magical. My Gmail account just became so much more useful