How many Email Addresses to Use

[JustVisitingThisPlanet]

I have about 10. On Yahoo mail, you can setup as many aliases as you want that point to same account. But I also have a few outside Yahoo that are tied to financial or more private use.

 

[Katsmeow]

I have about 10. On Yahoo mail, you can setup as many aliases as you want that point to same account. But I also have a few outside Yahoo that are tied to financial or more private use.

Do you separate out credits cards from other merchants where you may buy something online (think a website you buy something from)? Do you separate out forums such as this one? Social media?

I am struggling with where to create the groups for each email.

 

[JustVisitingThisPlanet]

^I don't have a strict system but in general use one alias for shopping services, another for forums, another for streaming/media services, another for temp services that might spam me, etc. No big deal if not followed strictly. And then a password manager also tracks the email used per site.

BTW, would suggest not using your ISP's email service for personal use as it might tend to lock you in to them.

 

[Katsmeow]

BTW, would suggest not using your ISP's email service for personal use as it might tend to lock you in to them.

About 17 years ago I set up my own domain name for exactly that reason. I figured that if I changed ISPs I didn't want to have to change my email address.

Later when Gmail came out I got a Gmail account and started using it to fetch my domain email and to send it but didn't switch entirely to Gmail mostly because I was worried it would go away and back then you couldn't get an archive of your mail.

Now, I have less reason for the separate domain. I am not worried Gmail will vanish and, in any event, I can download my emails. And having it fetch my emails is sometimes tedious as it doesn't do it immediately. And, Godaddy was just about to start charging for email on accounts where they host the domain (until now it has been free).

So, the idea is just to get a bunch of gmail emails and forward all of them (except the investment account one) to my existing gmail account.

Currently leaning to this line up:

1. Investment account email that doesn't get forwarded to my main Gmail account. I keep it separate. On the fence whether to have one for those accounts or a separate one for each institution.

2. Email for personal friends/family and major accounts that already know my actual real life identity (this email has a variation of my nickname and last name).

3. Email for most vendors/merchants and maybe some long term forums (like ER but not the forum I went to just to get a specific question answered).

4. Everything else - most other forums, online sites, social media and places I just use a throwaway for. These are mostly things where if I had to change my email it would be fine.

 

[sengsational]

...

If you think about what you are protecting from, it makes it more clear what to do, I think. With the financial institutions, big reputable ones, they are not highly likely to let your email address escape. So using one for all seems reasonable to me.

Then there are the random web site sign-ups, stores, etc. They routinely have data breaches. Those get a low value email. The spammers and scammers get the email address and password from a breach, then try the same email and password on the popular banks in your geography. A different password everywhere is highly advised (ie never reuse a password).

Personal correspondence email is a problem because the email address gets added to a distribution list for jokes or something, then a spammer/scammer breaks into one person's account and now everyone on the distribution gets spammed. Or another vector...some well-meaning friend types your email address in order to send you a "greeting card" from a shady site. Either way, the email address that "everybody has for you" is the spammiest one of all. If you abandon it, granny will never update and you loose touch.

I think the younger generation has the right idea: just don't use email

 

[Montecfo]

Email hygiene is probably easier for retired types like us. When you are setting up new investment and credit accounts, it can get a bit cumbersome.

I have 3 accounts: one I have had forever and still get mail on it from friends, but also spam and financial correspondence. A second is the "new" email I just give to close friends. 3rd is Gmail account that I never use except for things like Google services.

Each is with a different ISP. I always considered fragmenting my digital footprint to be more important than security of email accounts, which are by definition insecure.

Perhaps I should rethink this. I could carve out an address for financial insritutions fairly easily.

 

[JustVisitingThisPlanet]

^Yeah many major services data mine the hell out of us, even buying data from other services. The more email addresses you use, the more dispersed and less likely data miners can tie all of your activity together. Or at least decreasing chances.

 

[Katsmeow]

If you think about what you are protecting from, it makes it more clear what to do, I think. With the financial institutions, big reputable ones, they are not highly likely to let your email address escape. So using one for all seems reasonable to me.

Thanks for your very thoughtful reply. It is helpful.

The only concern is that if for some reason it does get out I've used it at other places. Really a total of 3, one bank and two for investments. But it isn't like I ever email any of these places. The correspondence is really one way and of course it is in their records. That said, my user name is different on all of them and, of course, passwords are not even similar.

Then there are the random web site sign-ups, stores, etc. They routinely have data breaches. Those get a low value email. The spammers and scammers get the email address and password from a breach, then try the same email and password on the popular banks in your geography. A different password everywhere is highly advised (ie never reuse a password).

No, I don't use the same password. As many I have seen do, for low value places I use a "core" password that I then modify for each place. The good part is that I can remember it and it is easy. I would not use that for places like credit cards or major merchants. I am thinking to combine all of these types of places to one email account. However, I would then have a separate account for the truly temp stuff. The website you have to give an email address to get something you want from them. Or the forum for some problem you went to in order to address the problem and will never go back. I plan to use a sort of throwaway account for that. I can easily just get rid of it if it gets too spamming.

Personal correspondence email is a problem because the email address gets added to a distribution list for jokes or something, then a spammer/scammer breaks into one person's account and now everyone on the distribution gets spammed. Or another vector...some well-meaning friend types your email address in order to send you a "greeting card" from a shady site. Either way, the email address that "everybody has for you" is the spammiest one of all. If you abandon it, granny will never update and you loose touch.

I think the younger generation has the right idea: just don't use email

Honestly, my kids rarely use email. Normally if they have to send something to someone that is required. I pretty much only email them if it is to send them something. Most of the older generation has died out so I don't have to worry about that. I have a few older but they are all email good citizens. And, I don't have anyone who does really any of the unsafe email stuff. Most of my personal email is for friends or similar aged relatives who don't live nearby so we keep up by email. In any event that group of friends/family that I give email to is -- let me check -- 9 people not including my kids.

As far as the email I've used for the last 18 years I actually will not be getting rid of it. I will keep it for at least several years. The domain doesn't renew until middle of next year and I will probably renew it then and transfer to Google domains. I will keep it just in case anything important comes in but I just won't use it any more.

 

[JustCurious]

And even better: Gmail ignores everything after a + sign to the left of the @ sign. So I.fired.2020@gmail.com and Ifired2020+ERForumorg@gmail.com and I.fired.2020+contest123@gmail.com all go to the same place.

Schwab does not allow email addresses that include the "+" symbol.

 

[nassa]

I've always used just two:


#1 for any person or entity that I have a personal or financial relationship with.
#2 for everything else


Also, I very occasionally use a free email masking service if I want to stay anonymous and not give away my email address.

 

[timo2]

I now have three: gmail for my personal account; yahoo for daily reading (the week, bloomberg, pew, 538, AP, etc): and hotmail for public email (local businesses, etc).

 

[harley]

Schwab does not allow email addresses that include the "+" symbol.

I've had the same email address since 1993. It's my name separated by an underscore "_" through hotmail. It's served me well, never getting too junked up an the filters work pretty well. However, recently I've started having some problems with certain sites that don't recognize the underscore as a valid email character. I can't remember which sites off the top of my head, but it's annoying. You can't even make a complaint or comment to the site, since they always ask for your email.

I do have a few others. I've got a business email/domain for our small business that is used on a nearly daily basis. The others have mostly been temporary throwaway addresses, used to sign up for something I wasn't sure about.

 

[Katsmeow]

I have worked out 5 email addresses:

1. One email address is new and I am using it for investment accounts/bank. That address will not interact with the others at all.

2. A new email address that will be for friends and significant accounts that I do ongoing business with (think mortgage company, that kind of thing). Also, will use for places like insurance, doctors, utilities, and so on. Still this is a relatively small group of entities and people.

3. An existing gmail account that I used only a limited amount in the past. This will be really the main day to day account for most merchants and others I deal with that don't fall elsewhere. The mail to the other accounts (except #1) will be forwarded to this account.

4. Email for things that are more temporary or occasional in nature or where I think there is a risk of spam. So the forum I had to sign up to in order to ask a question about a specific product. Or, the vendor I buy one thing from and will probably never use again. The point is that I am mostly not having ongoing contact with these people so it is easy to just replace this account. I will also use it for most social media accounts.

5. A separate email address for my battle.net account. While I have an authenticator on that account, I want to minimize any risk of problems so I am using an email address I set up a few years ago but haven't really used except a few times.

The biggest slow down in doing all this is having the change over from my existing accounts. I am going through my password manager to do this and it is slow going. I am not getting rid of my old email address so I have plenty of time. But this will probably take several weeks if not months to complete.