e-mail Validation

[Ramesh Etta]

Hi,
I have a text field to enter email, and when i enter the mail, it needs to validate in such a way that, only Business mail Ids should be accepted and all the free mails we can see
in the web should not be allowed.

I mean if enter mail id like [email protected], [email protected] etc should not be accepted. and business mails like ibm.com, oracle.com etc should be allowed.
I can put the free mailids in a list and validate, but how can i know that this particular mail id like xxx.xyz.com is free mail / business mail. ( as there are many free mails available on the web ).

Is there any way to check this.

Please reply.

[Rob Spoor]

I'm afraid not. Even an address like [email protected] could potentially be a business address, for someone actually working at Yahoo.

The best you can do is collect a list of free emailing services, and block those. Of course this list will never be complete because at any time a new one can pop up.

[Ulf Dittmer]

In addition to what Rob said, people who are self-employed or work as freelancers may not have what you'd consider a "business email address". GMail or Yahoo etc. may indeed be their primary business email.

[Ramesh Etta]

Thanks for your replies.

I am having the same concern too.

But if you find any kind of Java programs which can do validate the business mail id vs free mail ids please reply to the mail.

Thanks once again.

[Rob Spoor]

Ramesh Etta wrote:please reply to the mail.

We prefer to Use The Forum, Not Email.

[Paul Clapham]

Rob is correct. I work for a large corporation. Our customers are businesses, too. We send e-mail to lots of our customers, and it's not uncommon for them to be yahoo.com or aol.com or other free accounts.

So I guess that I (and maybe Rob too) am questioning what's the point of this requirement?

[Rob Spoor]

I can only guess it's to prevent people from quickly registering a free email address, using it for only a single time and then dumping it.

[Bauke Scholtz]

If that is true, then maintaining a blacklist is the only what you can do. But it is like mopping with an open valve.