How to protect my email address?

The following are some tips on protecting your email address from being collected by spammers:

1. NEVER communicate with spammers

   NEVER buy or enquire any products or services advertised in spam. Do not reply to any spam mail.

2. Avoid disclosing your official email address unless you know how it will be used

   Be careful when you need to fill in your email address in any paper or online copy forms.

3. Avoid posting your official email address in searchable format online

   Because spammers use specialized searching tools (Spambots) to scan web-pages, newsgroups, discussion forums ... etc. for email addresses, you should avoid posting your official email address online. If it is necessary to display your email address, you should try to disguise it. The following are some examples:

   • Display it as an image:

     My email address:

   • Display the "@" character as an image:

     My email address: tom.chancityu.edu.hk

   • Separate the email domain (e.g. "@cityu.edu.hk") of your email address

     Staff Name	Email Address
     Tom Chan	tom.chan
     Tai-Man Chan	tmchan
     ...	...

     (Please append "@cityu.edu.hk" at the end of the email address)

Note: You should also avoid using the "mailto:" hyperlinks for your email address, because they will be easily collected by spammers.

References: How do spammers get my email address?

Return to University In-house Email Service FAQ page

IT.ServiceDesk@cityu.edu.hk