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by koolba 2240 days ago
Are the names and email addresses in the sample data real? They seem auto generated but the domains are real providers like Hotmail, Gmail, and Outlook.
3 comments

Everything is randomised, nothing is based real data. It's auto generated from popular first names, last names, changing patterns and random years or numbers attached at the end. Domains are real, but randomised as well.
It's kinda risky in my opinion. I just checked a few of the addresses (mostly the one's without any numbers at the end), some of them do actually belong to real people.
I was aiming for a feeling of dealing with real data (even though it's not). Changing the email domain names to fictitious ones will solve this, but I think would undermine the feeling of real-ness.
What's the risk? Your email address isn't exactly a secret...
Well it's not exactly a risk, but people might get miffed their email is part of some website without their permission.

Also, in a rather grim coincidence, one of the emails I googled belonged to a person who had died in a car crash few years ago.

I was wondering the same thing. As combos of common names and providers, it seems extremely likely that many of those email addresses are valid addresses belonging to real people.
I searched a few emails in some local copies of data breaches and found real results