MercuryE MX limit
JonH
MercuryE is bouncing messages to who...@capgroup.com. Their DNS info lists
5 MX records, the first four are internal servers not accessable from the
internet. The fifth is outside their firewall and is supposed to relay the
mail into the internal servers. MercuryE tries and fails to connect to the
first 4 MX listed SMTP servers and then gives up, retries later, and ends up
bouncing the mail.
JonH
Jerry Park
Notice you are using onemain.com as your ISP. Onemain has been acquired
by earthlink.net . Earthlink blocks port 25. You will have to use
Mercury's relaying SMTP server through Earthlink's smpt server.
I've had problems with this too. I maintain a web site and email
services from Yahoo. Earthlink took over my ISP account and suddenly I
couldn't send mail anywhere. After several frustrating days, I finally
discovered the problem. Will soon switch ISP's . I don't believe that an
ISP should block access to a service I have paid for. I at least think
that the ISP should inform me when the ISP decides to change (reduce)
the services I have paid the ISP for. Earthlink has not been
particularly concerned that I've been experiencing problems with their
service.
Liz Marr
to domains in your Hosts file, or you can host your own DNS. Here are a
couple of programs to help -
FastDNS (http://www.alchemydev.com) which is a program that will search your
browser temp files and list the sites that you visit in your host file. I
notice the the above site is not available right now, but a web search
should produce the program.
ExtraDNS (http://www.extratools.com) is a real DNS server. It is
time-limited shareware. It worked so well for me that I bought it before
the time limit ran out. There are also other DNS programs out there as
well. Having my own DNS has solved all problems with outgoing except in the
instance that the dial-up does no allow relaying (such as MSN, Juno, or AOL)
Can't do much about that, I'm afraid.
"JonH" <JonH_00...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:3af1d2e9$0$14452$1dc6...@news.corecomm.net...
Mike Preston
wrote:
>Having my own DNS has solved all problems with outgoing except in the
>instance that the dial-up does no allow relaying (such as MSN, Juno, or AOL)
>Can't do much about that, I'm afraid.
The bigger services are starting to block (well, actually, redirect to
an internal proxy) port 25, outgoing in all circumstances. There was
a message earlier in this thread saying earthlink now does this. I
just discovered that AOL has started doing this, too. I just recently
upgraded to AOL6.0, so I'm wondering if it isn't part of the software.
I'll have to reintall 4.0 and see if I get the same thing.
Note that I"m using MercuryE and MercuryC (logging into a different
SMTP server than AOL's) and in both instances I looked at the logs and
even though it says at the top that it was connecting directly to the
server I had specified, the next line "intercepts" it and redirects it
to AOL's servers.
The mail went through in both cases, which is bizarre. I guess the
aol testing mechanism in this case is less draconian than when one is
intentionally using their servers. I attribute the mail getting
through to the fact that my connection was from a static-ip that isn't
listed on ORBS and that the identity of the sender resolves to a valid
internet-ip.
But, if I was on a dial-up, my bet is that the mail would have been
bounced. Maybe I'll test that in the next few days
It seems that Mercury's usefulness as a portable email server is being
throttled by the bigger ISP's.
fwiw
mike
Jerry Park
Fortunately, not all the big ones are blocking port 25. I don't know why
they do that anyway, but if enough people cancel because of port
blocking, they might stop. Earthlink just lost two accounts (mine and my
account at work) because of it.
>
> fwiw
>
> mike
Mike Preston
wrote:
True, and I would cancel my AOL account (I use it for backup and road
travel only) except for the fact that I save more than a year's
subscription fee by using its local dialup capability when I'm on the
road.
Such is life.
mike
JonH
news:3AF5AB5F...@No.Spam...
> > On Sun, 6 May 2001 08:43:42 -0700, "Liz Marr" <nos...@cc-ent.com>
> > wrote:
> > The bigger services are starting to block (well, actually, redirect to
> > an internal proxy) port 25, outgoing in all circumstances. There was
> > a message earlier in this thread saying earthlink now does this. I
> > just discovered that AOL has started doing this, too. I just recently
> > upgraded to AOL6.0, so I'm wondering if it isn't part of the software.
> > I'll have to reintall 4.0 and see if I get the same thing.
> >
>
> they do that anyway, but if enough people cancel because of port
> blocking, they might stop. Earthlink just lost two accounts (mine and my
> account at work) because of it.
>
They are doing that to stop spammers who sign up for an account and then us
it to send as much spam as they can before the ISP cancels the account. In
many cases it's better anyway for a dial-up user to relay mail through the
ISP's mail server since the destination server may not always available and
the relay server should be always online and can retry multiple times until
it gets through so the dial-up user doesn't have to stay on-line.
JonH
JonH
> instance that the dial-up does no allow relaying (such as MSN, Juno, or
AOL)
> Can't do much about that, I'm afraid.
>
On Friday I added the problem domain with modified MX records to the WinNT
DNS server running on my network and that took care of the problem (until
they change their network again:). I'm on a T1 connection so I don't have to
worry about the ISP's filtering.
JonH
Jerry Park
Query? How does port 25 blocking prevent a spammer from signing up for
an account and sending all the spam he can before the ISP shuts down the
account?
Here are some reasons ISP should not block port 25:
1) If I get a lot of spam from someone using mail servers at ISP.net,
I'll set my mail to filter or reject all mail from ISP.net . So if a
user is forced to send through the ISP's mail server, many sites may
reject his mail because of the originating ISP.
2) Mail from m...@mydomain.com which originates from smtp.ISP.net looks
like spam to many mail filters. Looks like I'm using ISP.net to relay
spam -- why else wouldn't I send my mail from smtp.mydomain.com ?
3) If the ISP's mail server should go down, the clients using that ISP
cannot send mail at all. If port blocking is not if effect, I can
continue to send and receive mail regardless of any problems the ISP may
have with his mail servers so long as my mail server remains operational.
4) If I send spam from an account purchased, for example, from
yahoo.com, yahoo.com has an obligation to shut down my account. If the
spam originates from ISP.net however, yahoo.com will get spam complaints
about mail that never went through its servers. This confuses who is
doing what.
5) This makes it easy for a spammer to pretend to be me. Set up an ISP
account, use a from field stating the spammer is m...@mydomain.com, then
spam away. Since the mail did not go through my server, I can't prevent
this spoofing. (See #1 above). When mail comes to me from
y...@yourdomain.com but originates from y...@someISP.net, I think you may
be a spammer and will likely reject your mail.
6) What is really not appropriate is that ISP's do this and don't advise
their clients that they do it. When earthlink acquired onmain, all mail
from my home and from my business stopped going out. Spent about three
days trying to determine what was wrong with the servers at yahoo.com .
Earthlink didn't think the inconvenience of shutting down my mail
service was important enough to even tell me that they were doing it.
ISP's advertising their services fail to advertise that they block port
25. This is information the client needs to know to properly operate an
account.
Eduardo SUbelman
>
>Here are some reasons ISP should not block port 25:
I don't like port 25 blocking any more than you do. However, you
need to rethink your reasons why it's bad.
>1) If I get a lot of spam from someone using mail servers at ISP.net,
>I'll set my mail to filter or reject all mail from ISP.net . So if a
>user is forced to send through the ISP's mail server, many sites may
>reject his mail because of the originating ISP.
The ISP should block spam by limiting the number of messages a user can
send per second. This makes using the ISP undesirable for a spammer
without limiting legitimate users.
>2) Mail from m...@mydomain.com which originates from smtp.ISP.net looks
>like spam to many mail filters. Looks like I'm using ISP.net to relay
>spam -- why else wouldn't I send my mail from smtp.mydomain.com ?
This is wrong. Many legitimate users have mydomain.com hosted by an ISP,
without having their own SMTP server. They use the ISP's server for all
their outgoing mail, while still having their inbound and outgoing mail
look like it went to @mydomain.com. I did that for years. No company,
small medium or large, likes it's email address to be myco...@ISP.net
even if they don't want to manage or can't afford their own mail servers.
It makes them look amateurish.
>3) If the ISP's mail server should go down, the clients using that ISP
>cannot send mail at all. If port blocking is not if effect, I can
>continue to send and receive mail regardless of any problems the ISP may
>have with his mail servers so long as my mail server remains operational.
But what if the client's server goes down? I would assume that an ISP's
servers receive better 24x7 monitoring than the average small office customer
could ever provide.
>4) If I send spam from an account purchased, for example, from
>yahoo.com, yahoo.com has an obligation to shut down my account. If the
>spam originates from ISP.net however, yahoo.com will get spam complaints
>about mail that never went through its servers. This confuses who is
>doing what.
This will happen no matter where the mail originates from. Spammers will
still forge the yahoo.com address and yahoo.com will still get the complaints
whether the spam comes from ISP1.net (that blocks port 25) or it comes from
mydomain.com using ISP2.net (that does not block port 25). By blocking port
25, ISP1.net has better control over the spammer.
>5) This makes it easy for a spammer to pretend to be me. Set up an ISP
>account, use a from field stating the spammer is m...@mydomain.com, then
>spam away. Since the mail did not go through my server, I can't prevent
>this spoofing. (See #1 above). When mail comes to me from
>y...@yourdomain.com but originates from y...@someISP.net, I think you may
>be a spammer and will likely reject your mail.
It is easy for anyone to forge the m...@mydomain.com, no matter what SMTP
server she uses. Furthermore, when mail comes from y...@yourdomain.com but
originates from y...@someISP.net, you cannot just reject it - see my reply
to #2, above.
>6) What is really not appropriate is that ISP's do this and don't advise
>their clients that they do it. When earthlink acquired onmain, all mail
>from my home and from my business stopped going out. Spent about three
>days trying to determine what was wrong with the servers at yahoo.com .
>Earthlink didn't think the inconvenience of shutting down my mail
>service was important enough to even tell me that they were doing it.
>ISP's advertising their services fail to advertise that they block port
>25. This is information the client needs to know to properly operate an
>account.
I fully agree with you on this. I don't like port 25 blocking any more than
you do, but it's the easy way for an ISP to prevent spam.
Thomas. Stephenson
news:O%eK6.7961$vg1.6...@www.newsranger.com:
> In article <3AF8B2F8...@No.Spam>, Jerry Park says...
>>
>>Here are some reasons ISP should not block port 25:
>
> I don't like port 25 blocking any more than you do. However, you
> need to rethink your reasons why it's bad.
>
>>1) If I get a lot of spam from someone using mail servers at ISP.net,
>>I'll set my mail to filter or reject all mail from ISP.net . So if a
>>user is forced to send through the ISP's mail server, many sites may
>>reject his mail because of the originating ISP.
>
> The ISP should block spam by limiting the number of messages a user can
> send per second. This makes using the ISP undesirable for a spammer
> without limiting legitimate users.
I'm a legitimate user sending mail via my mail server to 70,000 valid mail
list members. This method again blocks the legitimate user while causing the
spammer very little problem.
>
>>2) Mail from m...@mydomain.com which originates from smtp.ISP.net looks
>>like spam to many mail filters. Looks like I'm using ISP.net to relay
>>spam -- why else wouldn't I send my mail from smtp.mydomain.com ?
>
> This is wrong. Many legitimate users have mydomain.com hosted by an ISP,
> without having their own SMTP server. They use the ISP's server for all
> their outgoing mail, while still having their inbound and outgoing mail
> look like it went to @mydomain.com. I did that for years. No company,
> small medium or large, likes it's email address to be myco...@ISP.net
> even if they don't want to manage or can't afford their own mail servers.
> It makes them look amateurish.
The headers will show the route in any case.
>
>>3) If the ISP's mail server should go down, the clients using that ISP
>>cannot send mail at all. If port blocking is not if effect, I can
>>continue to send and receive mail regardless of any problems the ISP may
>>have with his mail servers so long as my mail server remains operational.
>
> But what if the client's server goes down? I would assume that an ISP's
> servers receive better 24x7 monitoring than the average small office
> customer could ever provide.
That's why there are MX hosts. The MX hosts handles the inbound mail while
the people are getting the host back online. You couldn't send in either
setup.
>
>>4) If I send spam from an account purchased, for example, from
>>yahoo.com, yahoo.com has an obligation to shut down my account. If the
>>spam originates from ISP.net however, yahoo.com will get spam complaints
>>about mail that never went through its servers. This confuses who is
>>doing what.
>
> This will happen no matter where the mail originates from. Spammers will
> still forge the yahoo.com address and yahoo.com will still get the
> complaints whether the spam comes from ISP1.net (that blocks port 25) or
> it comes from mydomain.com using ISP2.net (that does not block port 25).
> By blocking port 25, ISP1.net has better control over the spammer.
Not much though. It causes the legitimate user more problem when they are
trying to figure out what's going wrong with their mail server.
>
>>5) This makes it easy for a spammer to pretend to be me. Set up an ISP
>>account, use a from field stating the spammer is m...@mydomain.com, then
>>spam away. Since the mail did not go through my server, I can't prevent
>>this spoofing. (See #1 above). When mail comes to me from
>>y...@yourdomain.com but originates from y...@someISP.net, I think you may
>>be a spammer and will likely reject your mail.
>
> It is easy for anyone to forge the m...@mydomain.com, no matter what SMTP
> server she uses. Furthermore, when mail comes from y...@yourdomain.com
> but originates from y...@someISP.net, you cannot just reject it - see my
> reply to #2, above.
>
>>6) What is really not appropriate is that ISP's do this and don't advise
>>their clients that they do it. When earthlink acquired onmain, all mail
>>from my home and from my business stopped going out. Spent about three
>>days trying to determine what was wrong with the servers at yahoo.com .
>>Earthlink didn't think the inconvenience of shutting down my mail
>>service was important enough to even tell me that they were doing it.
>>ISP's advertising their services fail to advertise that they block port
>>25. This is information the client needs to know to properly operate an
>>account.
>
> I fully agree with you on this. I don't like port 25 blocking any more
> than you do, but it's the easy way for an ISP to prevent spam.
But it doesn't stop spam and it causes a lot of other problem. You really
didn't address the real point of earthlink using port 25 blocking without
telling anyone about it. In addition, they don't call Earthlink "Earthspam"
for nothing in the news.admin.net-abuse.email forum.
>
>
>
Eduardo Subelman
Stephenson says...
>
>Eduardo Subelman<ab...@markmatrix.com> wrote in
>news:O%eK6.7961$vg1.6...@www.newsranger.com:
>
>> In article <3AF8B2F8...@No.Spam>, Jerry Park says...
>>>
>>>Here are some reasons ISP should not block port 25:
>>
>> I don't like port 25 blocking any more than you do. However, you
>> need to rethink your reasons why it's bad.
>>
>>>1) If I get a lot of spam from someone using mail servers at ISP.net,
>>>I'll set my mail to filter or reject all mail from ISP.net . So if a
>>>user is forced to send through the ISP's mail server, many sites may
>>>reject his mail because of the originating ISP.
>>
>> The ISP should block spam by limiting the number of messages a user can
>> send per second. This makes using the ISP undesirable for a spammer
>> without limiting legitimate users.
>
>I'm a legitimate user sending mail via my mail server to 70,000 valid mail
>list members. This method again blocks the legitimate user while causing the
>spammer very little problem.
You are right.
>>>2) Mail from m...@mydomain.com which originates from smtp.ISP.net looks
>>>like spam to many mail filters. Looks like I'm using ISP.net to relay
>>>spam -- why else wouldn't I send my mail from smtp.mydomain.com ?
>>
>> This is wrong. Many legitimate users have mydomain.com hosted by an ISP,
>> without having their own SMTP server. They use the ISP's server for all
>> their outgoing mail, while still having their inbound and outgoing mail
>> look like it went to @mydomain.com. I did that for years. No company,
>> small medium or large, likes it's email address to be myco...@ISP.net
>> even if they don't want to manage or can't afford their own mail servers.
>> It makes them look amateurish.
>
>The headers will show the route in any case.
Of course. I was merely pointing out that Jerry Park's reasons for not blocking
port 25 are not that good.
>>
>>>3) If the ISP's mail server should go down, the clients using that ISP
>>>cannot send mail at all. If port blocking is not if effect, I can
>>>continue to send and receive mail regardless of any problems the ISP may
>>>have with his mail servers so long as my mail server remains operational.
>>
>> But what if the client's server goes down? I would assume that an ISP's
>> servers receive better 24x7 monitoring than the average small office
>> customer could ever provide.
>
>That's why there are MX hosts. The MX hosts handles the inbound mail while
>the people are getting the host back online. You couldn't send in either
>setup.
Can you tell us more about MX hosts? It sounds like something I could use for
contingency when (and if) my in-house server (Mercury32) or DSL connection dies.
>>>4) If I send spam from an account purchased, for example, from
>>>yahoo.com, yahoo.com has an obligation to shut down my account. If the
>>>spam originates from ISP.net however, yahoo.com will get spam complaints
>>>about mail that never went through its servers. This confuses who is
>>>doing what.
>>
>> This will happen no matter where the mail originates from. Spammers will
>> still forge the yahoo.com address and yahoo.com will still get the
>> complaints whether the spam comes from ISP1.net (that blocks port 25) or
>> it comes from mydomain.com using ISP2.net (that does not block port 25).
>> By blocking port 25, ISP1.net has better control over the spammer.
>
>Not much though. It causes the legitimate user more problem when they are
>trying to figure out what's going wrong with their mail server.
Agreed. Again, I was pointing out the flaws in the original poster's reasoning,
not defending the blocking of port 25. If we are going to claim it's A Bad
Thing, we should have solid reasons.
>>>6) What is really not appropriate is that ISP's do this and don't advise
>>>their clients that they do it. When earthlink acquired onmain, all mail
>>>from my home and from my business stopped going out. Spent about three
>>>days trying to determine what was wrong with the servers at yahoo.com .
>>>Earthlink didn't think the inconvenience of shutting down my mail
>>>service was important enough to even tell me that they were doing it.
>>>ISP's advertising their services fail to advertise that they block port
>>>25. This is information the client needs to know to properly operate an
>>>account.
>>
>> I fully agree with you on this. I don't like port 25 blocking any more
>> than you do, but it's the easy way for an ISP to prevent spam.
>
>But it doesn't stop spam and it causes a lot of other problem. You really
>didn't address the real point of earthlink using port 25 blocking without
>telling anyone about it. In addition, they don't call Earthlink "Earthspam"
>for nothing in the news.admin.net-abuse.email forum.
Again, we agree. There is no excuse for changing the service you provide without
telling anyone. They only do it because they can get away with it. When my
former ISP (Primenet) sold its user base to Earthlink (with 10 days notice), I
bailed out as fast as I could.
>>
>>
>>
>
Thomas. Stephenson
>>That's why there are MX hosts. The MX hosts handles the inbound mail
>>while the people are getting the host back online. You couldn't send in
>>either setup.
>
> Can you tell us more about MX hosts? It sounds like something I could use
> for contingency when (and if) my in-house server (Mercury32) or DSL
> connection dies.
>
This is normally provided by your ISP. For example I'm running via scruznet
and they provide the MX host.
Answer Section:
stephens.sj.scruznet.com, MX, 0, stephens.sj.scruznet.com
stephens.sj.scruznet.com, MX, 10, mail.scruznet.com
stephens.sj.scruznet.com, A, 165.227.102.91
The priority if the MX host is by the number, the lowest number is first.
This says to the imcoming SMTP host to first try 165.227.102.91 (MX 0) when
sending mail to stephens.sj.scruznet.com. If you can't make a connection
then send it to mail.scruznet.com (MX 10). The server mail.scruznet.com
tries every 30 minutes (default) to pass the mail off to my system; I use the
ETRN command to speed this up when I get online.
Check with your DSL provider to see if they can do this. If they can't (or
won't) there are other places on the internet that can do this for you.