Help Centre
Welcome to the help centre. Select a category to see help articles for that topic.
Please note that this is still very much a work in progress, new articles will be added regularly.
Below you can find definitions for common terms used throughout this site.
Terminology
Aliases - Aliases or email aliases are email addresses that are associated with another destination email address. They are simply forwarding email addresses, in the case of addy.io all aliases created forward emails to your real recipient email addresses.
Standard Alias - A standard alias on addy.io is any alias that is created automatically when it receives its first email. If you signed up with a username of johndoe and gave out the following alias - hello@johndoe.anonaddy.com then this would be a standard alias.
Shared Domain Alias - A shared domain alias is any alias that has a domain name that is also shared with other users. For example anyone can generate an alias with the @anonaddy.me domain. Aliases with shared domain names must be pre-generated and cannot be created on-the-fly like standard aliases.
UUID Alias - A UUID alias is generated at the parent domain e.g. anonaddy.me and looks something like this - 94960540-f914-42e0-9c50-6faa7a385384@anonaddy.me. UUID stands for universally unique identifier, it is randomly generated string with no inherent logic (this applies to V4). Users who want maximum anonymity may choose to use this kind of alias as it does not include your username or any other identifying information in the email address.
Random Character Alias - A Random Character alias is generated at the parent domain e.g. anonaddy.me and looks something like this - x481n904@anonaddy.me.
Random Word Alias - A Random Word alias is generated at the parent domain e.g. anonaddy.me and looks something like this - circus.waltz449@anonaddy.me.
Deactivated Alias - When an alias is deactivated, any messages sent to it will be silently discarded. The sender will not be notified of the unsuccessful delivery.
Deleted Alias - When an alias is deleted, any messages sent to it will be rejected with the message "550 5.1.1 Recipient address rejected: Address does not exist". Deleted Aliases can be restored.
Forgotten Alias - When an alias is forgotten it is completely disassociated from your account.
- If the alias is a shared domain alias (e.g. @anonaddy.me) then it can never be restored or used again. Once a shared domain alias is forgotten, it will reject any emails sent to it with the same message as above.
- If the alias is a standard alias then it can be created again in the future since it will be as if it never existed in the database. Once a standard alias is forgotten, if someone sends an email to it and you have catch-all enabled then it will be created automatically again. If you would like the alias to reject any messages sent to it then you should delete it or disable catch-all for that domain.
Recipients - Your recipient email addresses are your real email addresses where aliases are forwarded to. You can set a default recipient for your account in your settings, this is where all aliases will forward emails if they have no other recipients attached. You can also set a default recipient for each custom domain and additional username.
Domains - Domains or custom domains can be added to your account and used to create aliases. You need to own/control a domain name to be able to add it to addy.io. You can purchase domain names from registrars such as namesilo.com, namecheap.com or gandi.net.
Usernames - On addy.io the term username can either reference the username that you signed up with or an additional username that you are able to add to compartmentalise your aliases. Usernames and additional usernames are unique across addy.io, they cannot be greater than 20 characters and can only contain letters and numbers.
Bandwidth - This is the amount of data that can be transmitted in a fixed amount of time. On addy.io bandwidth is incremented each time an email is forwarded or a reply is sent (this is the data). Every calendar month (e.g. January, February etc.) your bandwidth is reset to 0. When an alias is deactivated or deleted emails sent to it do not count towards your bandwidth.
GPG/OpenPGP Key - PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) is a public-key encryption program that has become the most popular standard for email encryption. You can add a public key to each recipient on addy.io. This public key is then used to encrypt all emails forwarded to that recipient. Only you will be able to decrypt these emails using the corresponding private key.
Fingerprint - A PGP fingerprint is a shorter version of a public key. It is used as an easy way to identify public keys and veryify that they are correct.