How Can I Find Out Where an Email Really Came From?

JMH · Aug 9, 2013

Just because an email shows up in your inbox labeled Bill.Smith@somehost.com, doesn’t mean that Bill actually had anything to do with it. Read on as we explore how to dig in and see where a suspicious email actually came from.

Today’s Question & Answer session comes to us courtesy of SuperUser—a subdivision of Stack Exchange, a community-drive grouping of Q&A web sites.

The Question

SuperUser reader Sirwan wants to know how to figure out where emails actually originate from:
How can I know where an Email really came from?
Is there any way to find it out?
I have heard about email headers, but I don’t know where can I see email headers for example in Gmail.

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How Can I Find Out Where an Email Really Came From?

JMH

Emeritus, Contributor