Spam Protected Email for WordPress

An inline WordPress Block Editor (Gutenberg) format tool that obfuscates email addresses to shield them from spam bots and web scrapers.

This plugin implements the email obfuscation techniques developed by Spencer Mortensen:

• Method 1.5 (Display None): Injects decoy HTML tags to confuse raw scrapers reading the page source.

• Method 2.8 (Conversion JS): Scrambles the href attribute on the server and uses browser-side JavaScript on DOMContentLoaded to dynamically build the mailto: link.

Features

• Gutenberg Integration: Adds a "Protect Email" button directly to the Block Editor inline toolbar alongside Bold, Italic, and Link tools.

• Smart Field Extraction: Automatically extracts highlighted email text into the setup popover and remembers previously saved addresses when editing.

• Dual-Layer Protection: Combines client-side DOM manipulation and HTML decoy elements for maximum bot resistance.

• Zero Dependencies: Uses native WordPress scripts and standard vanilla JavaScript without external libraries.

• Clean Fallback: Gracefully degrades while maintaining accessible text markup.

Installation & Setup

1. Download the plugin code spam-protected-email-wordpress-plugin.x.x.x.zip (where x.x.x is the latest version code) from the latest release and extract it inside your WordPress plugins directory (wp-content/plugins/).
2. Go to Plugins > Installed Plugins in your WordPress admin dashboard.
3. Locate Spam Protected Email and click Activate.

Usage in Block Editor

1. Open any post or page in the Block Editor.
2. Highlight text inside any standard Paragraph block (e.g., info@example.com or Contact Us).
3. Click the Email (envelope) icon in the inline block toolbar.
4. If your highlighted text contains @, the target email field will pre-fill automatically. Adjust if needed and click Apply.
5. Save or publish your content.

Requirements

• WordPress: 6.0+
• PHP: 7.4+
• Theme: Any Gutenberg-compatible theme (e.g., Twenty Twenty-Five).