[thelist] Checking to see that an email account exists

Joshua Olson joshua at waetech.com
Wed Jul 17 09:46:01 CDT 2002


----- Original Message -----
From: "Joel Canfield" <joel at spinhead.com>


> The only truly definite way I know of to verify an e-mail address is to
send
> a query, and if you get a valid response, it's a valid address. If you
> don't, it's inconclusive.
>
> In other words, make 'em validate their own addresses. If you're providing
a
> service which they've opted into, they'll expect it. If you're sp4mm1ng
> them, they'll ignore you and be happy.

To everybody that responded, thank you.  I found that ZEND link to be very
interesting.  Based on what I've read here, and based on a couple quick
tests telnetting into a couple mail servers, I've found that most are not
set up to do a VRFY and most say that every email box does indeed exist for
its domain.  Thanks again.

-joshua






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