I’m working on an app (in PHP & JavaScript) that lets users generate content (short stories), and I want to add in a “email this to your friend” button.
I’m worried, though, that this could be used to send spam.
What are some things I could do to prevent that from happening? I am thinking:
1) The user must confirm their own personal email address before I send it
2) I have a hidden field somewhere that bots would fill in
What else should I do?
Cheers
I see two solutions to your problem.
1) Only allow registered users to send an e-mail. This may be a bad idea if you intend to have this website mainly visited by non-registered people.
2) Add a captcha to the form. This will prevent bots to be able to send anything at all.
What did you see online? How do people deal with this problem on their own sites? Try surfing the web, going to blogs, forums, etc. and see what they use to protect themselves. Maybe they have better ideas than me.