|  | Posted by Oli Filth on 06/08/05 03:18 
dorayme said the following on 08/06/2005 01:00:>>From: Oli Filth <catch@olifilth.co.uk>
 >
 >>Trying to obfuscate e-mail addresses (that can be clicked on as an <A
 >>href="mailto:..."> link) with Javascript, etc. is an exercise in
 >>futility. Eventually there'll be a spam-bot that is capable of
 >>deciphering whatever scheme you use, and then your address will be on
 >>their lists forever.
 >
 > If I recall, Jim is not into ASP or PHP. Perhaps he should be?
 
 A server-side language is always worth learning. As soon as you do,
 you'll realise on all the possiblities that a dynamic site bring!
 
 > There are sites to assist you to hide the email address from robots. As Oli
 > has implied, they will ultimately fail when the harvesters get smarter. A
 > sort of arms race. I have used
 > http://automaticlabs.com/products/enkoderform/ with some success judging by
 > lack of spam (but this could be for other reasons, it is no solid evidence).
 > Perhaps Oli's "futile" is a bit strong.
 
 The reason I say "futile" is because you won't know that a bot has
 deciphered your e-mail address until it's too late and you start
 recieving spam. By that point, the game's up and you'll have to change
 address. So it's not an arms race in that respect - it's not like you
 can always keep one step ahead of the bots (not without constantly
 changing addresses). So in that sense (i.e. you e-mail address will
 inevitably end up on a list at some point), you may as well not bother!
 
 However, as Mitja pointed out earlier in the thread, perhaps I
 overestimate the persistence of spam bots.
 
 
 --
 Oli
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