Send a blank email to [email protected] to get a copy of this message
On Fri, Jun 7, 2013 at 1:30 PM, Terry Ellison <[email protected]>wrote:
> The background to this is that I am a community contributor to PHP> internals and have been actively engaged on the internals and pecl-dev> lists for over a year using my personal domain email address (terry at> ellisons dot org dot uk). When I attempted to post some comments on an> internals thread a week ago, I received a>> [email protected] SMTP error from remote mail server after MAIL> FROM: Terry at ellisons dot org dot uk> host pair1.php.net [76.75.200.58]: 550 5.7.1 reject mailfrom [xbl]>>
There have been some reports of bounced mails on internals recently. I
didn't follow up on the issue, but I would suggest opening a bug report for
this.
Also CCing to internals list since this probably isn't the correct list for
this.
> After 3 days or research and over 30 emails, most of which were being> bounced, and a LOT of personal frustration, I have finally adopted a> workaround which is to use my gmail account.>> As I have a workaround, this email is NOT a request for personal support.> It is to raise a flag that this issue might be a wider issue for other PHP> contributors who might just give up and take their contributions elsewhere.> What I want to share is my analysis in the hope that if this is a systemic> issue then it might help to prevent this happening.>> 1) My original mailbox has been active on php.net for over a year and has> never been used for spamming on PHP lists.>> 2) Thoughout this incident the spamhaus XBL gives my ellisons... domain a> green. It only hosts 3 active mailboxes and none have compromised to my> knowledge.>> 3) A week or so ago, something changed and as a result the php.netmailserver began rejecting my
> ellisons... emails.>> 4) The mail denial has a wider scope than just me in that is any> contributor who now replies to any thread which includes my ellisons...> domain as a CC will also have their posts rejected.>> 5) I get my internet connection (and a dynamic class IP address) from the> main UK ISP, BT. My ISP registers Policy Block Lists (PBL) for all its> class B IP ranges with spamhuas: "It is the policy of BT Retail that> unauthenticated email sent from this IP address should be sent out only via> the designated outbound mail server allocated to BT Retail customers." The> key word to note here is *unauthenticated*. This is quite a common> practice for ISPs.>> 6) I also have a personal domain, ellisons dot org dot uk, which is hosted> by a 3rd party hosting service provider (HSP). My HSPs email service> doesn't use DKIM, so I have to rely on SPF instead, which I have configured> on my DNS entry for ellisons dot org dot uk. This is a valid> authentication mechanism, as can be seen from the following Google> mailserver report:>> Received-SPF: pass (google.com: domain of Terry at ellisons dot org> dot uk> designates 79.170.44.47 as permitted sender) client-ip=79.170.44.47;>> Authentication-Results: mx.google.com;> spf=pass (google.com: domain of Terry at ellisons dot org dot uk> designates> 79.170.44.47 as permitted sender) smtp.mail=Terry at ellisons dot> org dot uk>> 7) However, SPF filters are fragile in that if the mail is routed through> multiple hops, say, HSP -> intermediary -> php.net <http://php.net>,> then the receiving php.net <http://php.net> host might treat
> the> intermediary host as the sender, and the SPF filter check will then> incorrectly fail. This can then result in the SPAM filter on the mail> server incorrectly rejecting the message and also blacklisting the domain.>> As I said previously, I am now using gmail, a DKIM-authenticated service,> so I don't see any future problems personally, but I am concerned that this> might be a wider issue for other contributors who post from an ISP> allocated IP using a personal mail service.>> A) Can I suggest that a review of the rejection logs be correlated> against age of registration for that mailbox to see if this is a wider> issue?>> B) Can you please add a health warning on the mailing lists web page> suggesting that contributors use a DKIM-authenticated mail service for> contributing to the php.net lists?>> Regards> Terry Ellison> (previously posting under terry at ellisons dot org dot uk)>> --> PHP Webmaster List Mailing List (http://www.php.net/)> To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php>>