Can two people have the same email address?

Can two people have the same email address? I ask this because I now keep getting messages from my own address? I always thought that email addresses cannot be duplicated! If this is true, why am I getting messages from the same email?
Crystal Edwards

An email address is akin to a real world postal address. If two people have the same address it means they are living in the same house… or in case of email, using the same account! Thus, two people cannot have the same email address; though they can share the account, email addresses cannot be duplicated! So why are you getting email from yourself?

Email spoofing – getting messages from same email address?

Since no one else is using your email address (unless, of course, the account has been hacked), the only way you can get messages from the same address is via spoofing. Without going into too much of technical detail, email spoofing is a common tactic used by spammers to get your attention… and they generally succeed, right?

Even ordinary developers can create a program that can send messages from a specified email address. For instance, one can code a Perl script in a couple of minutes that can send out tons of messages from any email account. How do I know this? Because I too have written such programs for fun, of course; very simple, as I mentioned.

However, though it may look that messages originate from the same email address, they actually do not! Your account is still probably safe and sound. Spammers simple change the email headers so that it appears that messages are from a specified account.

You may also be interested in knowing how to keep an email account private.

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