English
spamblock
From spam + block.
Proto-Indo-European *bʰelǵ- ‘thick plank’
…
Old Dutch *blok ‘log’
Middle Dutch blok ‘treetrunk’
Old French bloc ‘log’
Middle English blok ‘log’
English block
Today it means
noun Text inserted into an email address in order to make it invalid, though still readable to a human being. For example, in "jsmith-[AT]-example-[DOT]-com", the "@" and "." symbols have been replaced with literal text to prevent automated spambots from finding the email address while still leaving it readable.
Sources
Sources: Wiktionary, “spamblock”. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.
Etymograph / spamblock