Gmail addresses are not unique

[rockfan4]

My gmail address has been firstname.lastname@gmail for a long time.
I just tried signing in without the period, and it brought me to my account, so I doubt there's a second account, all my info is there.

I have a fairly unique name, from what I can find there's only 3 of us in the US with the same first and last name. That being said, the wife of another one of "me" frequently signs up for stuff with my name @ gmail.com, and I get weird newsletters from time to time. I used to get offers to test drive a truck and get $50, but I haven't got one of those in a long time.

[svandamme]

Originally Posted by wdfifteen

All I know is what happened. When you look at the addresses they look the same. This one time he got an email meant for me. I’ve never gotten one meant for him. I have no idea what goes on behind the computer screen. Maybe one of the squirrels (or is it monkeys?) flipped the wrong switch that time.

what format is your email adres, so we get an idea here.

[wdfifteen]

Originally Posted by svandamme

what format is your email adres, so we get an idea here.

lastname.firstname@gmail.com

[willtel]

Oh man this is weird, really weird.

I also have a Gmail account that is in firstname.lastname format and my name is also Patrick.

I also get other peoples emails all the time. Some of them to a professional photographer that shares my full name. Hell I got one this morning from some event manager in Arizona wanting to forward my contact info to someone about an event I'm supposedly working.

wdfifteen, PM your email address if you don't mind. I wonder how similar ours are.

[svandamme]

Originally Posted by wdfifteen

lastname.firstname@gmail.com

Can you send me the STMP header of an email you sent to him ? in PM

How to read email full headers
Open the email you want to check the headers for.
Next to Reply Reply, click the Down arrow Down Arrow.
Click Show original.
Copy the text on the page.

paste it in pm, you can strip the message you sent him, i just need the SMTP header

[Halm]

Just tested this. From my O365 account, I sent an email to my Gmail account adding a random "period" inserted.

Makes no sense.

[wdfifteen]

Originally Posted by svandamme

Can you send me the STMP header of an email you sent to him ? in PM

I’ll have to do it when I can get to my computer. This iPad is a pain to do anything on but type and read.

[Otter74]

My gmail address is of the format .; I regularly get emails that are meant for my cousin, who shares my email address but for his middle initial inserted. Initially I was mystified but it didn't take long to figure out via context and content that they're for him, so I either forward them or write them back and give them the correct address. But what does mystify me more is that I regularly get a monthly bank statement for a man in Panama who shares my first initial and paternal family name. And occasional emails with things like quotes for road construction projects in Venezuela (?) Trying to correct them seems to have no effect.

[Tobra]

Advantage of having a unique name I suppose...

[Bob Kontak]

Originally Posted by Halm

Just tested this. From my O365 account, I sent an email to my Gmail account adding a random "period" inserted.

Makes no sense.

Did it come through?

[Halm]

Yes, it came through. To be a bit more clear, my gmail address is first and middle initial plus last name, all one word. I added a dot (.) between the initials and last name. It came right through and a quick look at the the header appeared completely normal.

[RKDinOKC]

Gmail must be stripping special characters including "." from all email addresses.

[Halm]

In case anyone is still working on this, I have a Hotmail/Outlook account that is first-dot-last@ address. I just tried to log in as FirstLast@ and it would not recognize the account.

Makes me think this is a Gmail thing.

[svandamme]

no doubt about that

[theFONZ]

I have had a gmail account since gmail was new. It’s firstlast@gmail.com. A few years after I had it I started getting emails that were legit, but weren’t for me. Apparently there is someone with my same name in England that is using first.last@gmail.com. I randomly get bills, business info, and other things. I contacted gmail years ago and they told me that he can’t have the same address with a “.” but that sure seems like what’s happened.

[eastbay]

Happened to me on the Comcast email system. No dots in the address either, had to send multiple screenshots to Comcast security support and it still took them over a month to fix it. Same support excuse, "it can't happen", well look at the f'n screenshots I'm sending you.

[stomachmonkey]

I’m telling you guys. This was a thing at one time.

Willing to bet the original dev team was split, front end UX/UI team, back end team who handled the DB, and the guys working on the actual functionality.

Either the UI/UX guys did not think to prevent the use of periods and the DB guys were focused on using user names as the check for duplicate accounts.

It’s not a difficult thing to screw up in a large multi team deployment.