Disposable email addresses in Gmail

24Mar11

Everyone has their method of avoiding spam and here’s how I’m doing it.  I’m using what I call disposable email addresses in Gmail.

The idea is that I periodically create new Gmail email accounts that forward to my main Gmail account.  When any one email address is ‘compromised’ and ends up with a lot of spam, I can either delete the email account or use filters in my main gmail account so I don’t see them.

I recently gave out an email address to the Men’s Warehouse when buying a suit and since then I’ve noticed a lot more spam messages in my in box.  Time to block that email.

Here’s how I do it:

(assuming you already have a Gmail account, I’ll refer to it as your ‘master’ account)

1. Create bogus email address at Gmail.com that you can easily remember.  This is what you’ll give out to retailers, promotions, websites.. whatever.  I’ll use Faithful.Fountains@gmail.com It’s helpful to use a random word generator to come up with a combination of words.

2. In the upper right corner, click ‘settings‘ In your newly created Gmail account. Click on the Forwarding and POP/IMAP. Use the options to ‘forward’ your email and when prompted, enter your ‘master’ gmail account email address.

3. Log into your ‘master’ gmail account and you should see a confirmation email.  Click on the link,.. now you have forwarding set up.

At this point, you’ll never have to log into your newly created gmail account again.  Everything that gets sent to that email address will be forwarded to your ‘master’ gmail email account.

Now you have control over what makes it into your email inbox.  If you find that one of the email addresses is putting a lot of spam into your ‘master’ gmail inbox, you can click the more button in gmail and choose ‘filter emails like this’ and choose to ‘archive immediately’ if the to: address is your disposable email address you gave out.  You’ll still receive emails from the disposable email address, they just won’t be shown as new mail in your inbox.

Added bonus: Send emails with a FROM: address of your disposible email from within your ‘master’ gmail account.   This is handy when you’re initiating the conversations, for example, responding to a craigslist posting. (of which are notorious for spamming)

1. Log into your ‘master’ gmail account and navigate to settings.  On the Account and Import tab, click Send mail from another address.

2. Continue through the wizard by entering your disposable email address.  I’m entering Faithful.Fountains@gmail.com address.  Then click the Send Verification button.

3. Log into the disposible email account you created.  You’ll find a confirmation email with a verification link that you’ll need to click.

Now when you log back into your ‘master’ gmail account and compose an email you’ll see a drop-down box in the ‘from’ address with your newly linked gmail account.  Mine says Faithful.Fountains@gmail.com

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