A Guide to Email Obfuscation

There are different types of obfuscation, some more difficult to execute than others.  Javascript obfuscation methods work especially well, but require a certain amount of knowledge in creating and implementing Javascript.  We’ll focus on the simplest method which involves converting the characters in your email address to ASCII characters.  The method isn’t 100% foolproof, but it’s fast and easy to implement and should significantly cut back on the amount of spam you receive.

You’ll start with an email that looks like this:

info@yourdomain.com

When you embed this email in your webpage, the code looks like this.

<a href=”mailto: info@yourdomain.com “> info@yourdomain.com </a>

To obfuscate the email address, we take our link: info@yourdomain.com

And paste it into this email obfuscator.  The output will look something like this.

<a href=”mailto:i&#110;&#102;&#111;&#64;&#121;o&#117;&#114;&#100;&#111;&#109;a&#105;&#110;&#46;&#99;
&#111;&#109;”>&#105;&#110;&#102;o&#64;yo&#117;&#114;&#100;&#111;m&#97;&#105;n.&#99;&#111;&#109;</a>

Select and copy the output code, and paste it into the source code of your webpages.  Make sure you do this for every email address on your site, and make sure you test the links afterwards.