Re: How I spent my Christmas vacation - Email found in subject
- From: Danny <nocmonkey@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: "[ISAserver.org Discussion List]" <isalist@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 18:34:39 -0500
On 1/3/06, Ball, Dan <DBall@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 1. I have to send NDRs out to people sending in mis-typed addresses, we
> deal a lot with get general public, people make typos on e-mail
> addresses all the time. Without the NDRs, many people would send e-mail
> and "assume" it went through, and plan their activites according to
> those assumptions.
No, Dan, you have obviously misunderstood.
Yes, NDR's are good, BUT they should only be generated during the
original SMTP conversation and be supplied by the sending server, not
the recipients server. NDR's should not be sent as new emails like
pre-2003 Exchange (with Recipient filtering of non-existent
addresses). Now do you understand why your Bad Mail directory wastes
so many resources? This would not be a problem if Exchange did not
accept email to non-existent recipients.
> We don't know if the originating addresses are valid until we attempt to send
> the
> NDR.
You do not understand, so I will help:
1) Send an email to helpmeunderstandsmtp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
2) Tell us which SMTP server you received your NDR from
The sending SMTP server should be responsible for supplying the sender an NDR.
> 2. Due to the wide variety of SMTP servers connecting to us, we cannot
> "require" them to use a certain type of protocol just to send us e-mail.
It's called the SMTP protocol, refer to the RFC's. It's the only one
you need to support for SMTP-based email.
> Thus, we allow everything to come in, and then deal with the results.
I am sorry to hear that your organization is purely reactive.
> Too many people in the education industry run the cheapest software they
> can get, whether it is freeware or stuff that is 10-15 years old it
> doesn't matter. As long as it is free.
What is your point? Most of the Internet's mail servers are running
Sendmail or Postfix - both of which are "free" to obtain.
Free does not mean it is crap.
> 3. Unfortunately, no-one can identify spammers by their e-mail address
> or originating server, so it is impossible to tell if we're sending
> e-mail to spammers or not.
I am glad that you understand the first part, you know, that people
can spoof their email address. But, this doesn't have to a problem;
see above.
> The proposed backscatter solution is just a dream.
Wrong, and I totally disagree with your attitude towards the
situation, one that you do not totally understand. Google: email
backscatter.
> While I agree that it IS a problem, and that there are several ways around it,
> there is no "practical" solution at this time.
See above.
> Unless we can get EVERYONE running completely compatible DNS servers, it
> will remain an illusive dream.
This does not relate to compatible or incompatible DNS servers.
> In the meantime, we contribute to the e-mail backscatter problem daily not
> by choice but by necessity.
Wrong. " "
> Blocking e-mail that doesn't come from a "compatible" server is entirely out
> of
> the question for us right now.
Who said anything about blocking email from non-compatible servers?
...D
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