I am trying to build a email messaging system for a classified site ( a la craigslist), so that users can email each other. emails of registered users are stored in a database.
What I want is for the recipients email address to be hidden from the sender’s . If I just use the mail() function and dynamically get the recipients email from the database, will this email be visible to the person sending the mail ??
if the recipients email is indeed hidden from the sender’s when using mail() this way, then why does craigslist anonymize’s email ? isn’t it already anonymous ?
Edit: so the email won’t be visible to the person filling the form. SO the question remains is why does craigslist anonymizes email addresses? and whether I should implement the same ?
Craigslist doesn’t use a form to submit. They provide an email address. When the users send the email using their own email system to @craigslist.org, then their servers get that email, look up the appropriate record, and forward the email to the real email address, so the sender never sees the real email address of the person.
If you’re providing a form for the users to fill out, then you’re doing something completely different from craigslist. You don’t have to show the person’s real email address on the form, and they’re using your form, not their own email program, to do the reply, so there’s no need to show any email address at all, anonymous or real.
If you’re going to let people use their own email programs and provide them with an email address, then use the anonymizing service, which will add some load to your servers since they’ll have to parse and process incoming emails at a variety of addresses. If you’re using a form, you don’t have to show any email addresses at all.