[poincaredisk]

Are you sure they were confused people? More probable explanation is that they made typos while entering their email.

The alternative explanation, that they roitinely use [your name].[your last name]@gmail.com as their email, and don't realize that it never works is... unlikely IMO.

[meowster]

One of the emails had a phone number for the intended recipient, so I called. It was an old person who was definitely confused.

I can easily imagine there are a bunch of older people who do not have email addresses, yet just about everything requires an email address, even if it's not necessary for whatever service, so people have to either make up an address, or incorrectly remember what the address was that their children or grandchildren set up for them.

Either way, that doesn't excuse the companies that spam innocent people.

[fcatalan]

My wife has been receiving medical appointments, test results, event tickets, package tracking numbers and so on destined to a few old ladies for years. I once tracked the sons and nephews of one and told them, and they apparently thought I was some kind of scammer and didn't return messages after a couple exchanges, so to this day she still receives all those.