Mailchimp API issues-took down our server

[Allison Dorst]

Hi we had an issue today where our server was taken down and our server team said that it was because mailchimp was sending 300 requests a second.

Here is the info from our Linux Admin



When we logged onto the server I noticed that Mail Chimp was sending a lot of POSTs to the server, 4-5 times a second.

74.86.53.49 - - [31/Jul/2013:13:06:52 -0500] "POST /tennis/monkey/webhook/index/wkey/022d76e5bffc0afctennis/ HTTP/1.1" 200 - "-" "MailChimp.com"
74.86.53.49 - - [31/Jul/2013:13:06:52 -0500] "POST /tennis/monkey/webhook/index/wkey/022d76e5bffc0afctennis/ HTTP/1.1" 200 - "-" "MailChimp.com"
74.86.53.49 - - [31/Jul/2013:13:06:52 -0500] "POST /tennis/monkey/webhook/index/wkey/022d76e5bffc0afctennis/ HTTP/1.1" 200 - "-" "MailChimp.com"
74.86.53.49 - - [31/Jul/2013:13:06:52 -0500] "POST /tennis/monkey/webhook/index/wkey/022d76e5bffc0afctennis/ HTTP/1.1" 200 - "-" "MailChimp.com"
74.86.53.49 - - [31/Jul/2013:13:06:52 -0500] "POST /lifestyle/monkey/webhook/index/wkey/022d76e5bffc0afclifestyle/ HTTP/1.1" 200 - "-" "MailChimp.com"
74.86.53.49 - - [31/Jul/2013:13:06:52 -0500] "POST /golf/monkey/webhook/index/wkey/022d76e5bffc0afcgolf/ HTTP/1.1" 200 - "-" "MailChimp.com"
74.86.53.49 - - [31/Jul/2013:13:06:52 -0500] "POST /tennis/monkey/webhook/index/wkey/022d76e5bffc0afctennis/ HTTP/1.1" 200 - "-" "MailChimp.com"
74.86.53.49 - - [31/Jul/2013:13:06:52 -0500] "POST /fitness/monkey/webhook/index/wkey/022d76e5bffc0afcfitness/ HTTP/1.1" 200 - "-" "MailChimp.com"
74.86.53.49 - - [31/Jul/2013:13:06:52 -0500] "POST /fitness/monkey/webhook/index/wkey/022d76e5bffc0afcfitness/ HTTP/1.1" 200 - "-" "MailChimp.com"

I've temporarily blocked two IPs.

From the MailChimp documentation here:
http://apidocs.mailchimp.com/webhooks/

When an event occurs that you have turned on, we'll send a HTTP POST request to the URL you've specified. If that URL is unavailable or takes too long to respond (more than 15 seconds), we'll cancel the request and try again later. Retries happen at increasing intervals over the course of one hour and 15 minutes. Those time frames may be tweaked as we receive feedback from users.

The two IPs I've dropped are (74.86.53.49|74.86.53.44).

[jesse]

You or your developers should assess how and when you're using or want to be using webhooks and configure things appropriately.


jesse

[Allison Dorst]

Can you explain a bit more? We have been using mailchimp for over a year and never seen this

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[jesse]

Not exactly, but I can try restating the same thing with more words. You've configured webhooks to contact you when certain events happen from various pathways. You'll need to look at what you have configured, at what was being sent that you now may feel you don't need, whatever events occurred during that time period to cause us to send you the data you requested, and the such to determine what changes need to be made to your webhook configuration, your own processes, or both.


jesse

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