From Name Games To Guessing Games

My (large, multi-national) company uses a standard email format, as most do, so if you know the format, you can usually guess someone’s email address. I have a very common last name but was the first person with that last name and my first initial, so I got the standard setup. If my name is Jennifer Smith, I got smithj@[address].

A couple of years after I started, Jane Smith started. They set up her email as smith.jane@[address]. She’s in a different country and has a completely different role from me. I get a lot of emails addressed to her from people who are just guessing at her email address. Sometimes it’s stuff really for Jane, which I forward. Other times, it’s generic spam. This morning I found this in my inbox:

Emailer: “Good morning, Jane Smith! Are we reaching the right person in a company to market/sell your products or services?”