Email server blacklisted by gmail/msn

[papuchazo]

I followed procedures to be delisted from both places. Msn was very prompt and in less than 2 days we were able to email msn/hotmail/live emails.

Gmail has taken over 3 weeks and still not a response at all to the removal request. From what I found out online, GMAIL doesn't really get in touch with you, they just either randomly remove you or they don't.

Seeing how long this is taking, I was tasked to figure out if there was any way to work around this issue without having to make temp company emails with another email provider.

They host their email with exchange 2003. I read a couple of interesting posts that mentioned SendGrid as a solution to a similar issue someone was having. From what I can tell SendGrid is a smart host, right? So if we use them as a smart host for the exchange server will they now be able to send email to gmail accounts?

If so, is it because the ip that gmail will see is going to be different?

Thanks.

 

[pceinc]

What ISP is the server on? Do you have a static IP? Is the static IP in the same range as the DHCP IP's provided by the ISP? If so you will encounter this over and over. Best to use a Smarthost as you read or go hosted exchange.

 

[NYJimbo]

What caused you to be listed, what did you do to fix the problem and what warning or feedback did you get from gmail or people using gmail to clue you into what they wanted done?

I have many servers and we get blocked on different ones to different hosts several times a year. Depending on what went wrong that will determine what we do next and who we contact.

Sometimes when you get blocked its not the actual recipients host who blocks you but the hosts reference to a reputation or blocking list company. If you are on a list OR if your reputation is below some level the host you send to blocks you and THEY cannot change it. As long as they use that SBL or reputation company then they will not accept your email.

So if you can provide more info maybe some of us can help with more ideas.

 

[papuchazo]

What ISP is the server on? Do you have a static IP? Is the static IP in the same range as the DHCP IP's provided by the ISP? If so you will encounter this over and over. Best to use a Smarthost as you read or go hosted exchange.

ISP: optimum
Static Ip: yes
DHCP: I believe so
Hosted exchange is not an option for them, sadly.

So after adding a Smarthost, that should get their emails working with GMAIL again as long as they don't get blacklisted again while using said smarthost, right?

What caused you to be listed, what did you do to fix the problem and what warning or feedback did you get from gmail or people using gmail to clue you into what they wanted done?

I have many servers and we get blocked on different ones to different hosts several times a year. Depending on what went wrong that will determine what we do next and who we contact.

Sometimes when you get blocked its not the actual recipients host who blocks you but the hosts reference to a reputation or blocking list company. If you are on a list OR if your reputation is below some level the host you send to blocks you and THEY cannot change it. As long as they use that SBL or reputation company then they will not accept your email.

So if you can provide more info maybe some of us can help with more ideas.

Server was sending out spam from an NDR attack. Deleted the queue of thousands of spam emails (ndrs?) that were still left to send. I fixed all the settings that were incorrectly configured or not done: Added SPF record, recipient filtering, added zen.spamhaus.org blacklist. Used MXTOOLBOX to check status and we are not listed in any of the total listed blacklists.

When they email any GMAIL clients, they receive an auto-response:
reason: 550-5.7.1 [xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx] Our system has detected an unusual rate of>

So I followed their guidelines and sent the removal request. It's a direct block by GMAIL. In the message queue I saw that the thousands of messages left to send were 90% going to gmail addresses.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

So after adding a Smarthost, that should get their emails working with GMAIL again as long as they don't get blacklisted again while using said smarthost, right?

Depends on how/why Google is blocking you....I'm not up on what mechanisms they use in their filtering, but moving to an SMTP outbound service may or may not help you out here as far as getting an immediate fix. IMO...it would help you in the long run by lessening the chances of getting blacklisted again.

How does your report look at MXToolbox.com?

 

[papuchazo]

I offered a security checkup and security tightening before but their semi IT guy advised that while that sounds like a good idea and wouldn't hurt anything, it was a waste of money since they are a small operation that no "hacker" would be interested in wasting their time on

The blacklist is 100% OK (8 time outs).

Smtp test:
Status Result
OK - xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx resolves to xxx.com
OK - Reverse DNS matches SMTP Banner
Warning - Does not support TLS.
0 seconds - Good on Connection time
OK - Not an open relay.
5.398 seconds - Warning on Transaction Time

Port scan:
25 smtp Success 62
All others were refused connection.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

, it was a waste of money since they are a small operation that no "hacker" would be interested in wasting their time on .

There are many reasons Exchange Servers are sought after by "hackers"....aside from the obvious ways of getting into networks and getting information, they're often just sought after to "hijack" so they can use it to send spam. Consequences to the client? You have one of them...their server gets blacklisted.

 

[papuchazo]

They are not happy with the guy after all this and they asked if I had monthly plans. Which is what got me studying msp as much as I can these past few days.

Bought the Managed services in a month book to get the basics down.

 

[Instant Housecall - Corey]

1. Do you have SPF and DKIM set up on the mail server? (check the DNS TXT records if you're not sure)
2. Are you using DMARC to get feedback from mail providers that flag your messages as spam?

In a nutshell:

• SPF verifies to the receiver that the server you send from is allowed to send e-mail for your domain.
• DKIM does something very similar, but it also signs the message cryptographically, making it more authoritative.
Using these two tools, your e-mails are much less likely to be marked as spam. They also prevent other spam servers from forging e-mails as if they’re from your domain (and getting your “from” domain name blacklisted) when sending to other people.

“DMARC”, also configured as a TXT in your DNS, will send you the results of e-mails sent with envelopes from your domains on a daily basis back to you to tell you whether or not your e-mails were marked as spam, and of any forgeries of your from domain.

It lets you monitor the success rates for e-mails you (or your customers) send to their clients.

You'll also want to make sure that you're not set up as an open relay by mistake and that e-mails are all authenticated by extension.

A great tool for checking if everything is set up properly, and whether or not your e-mail looks spammy: send an e-mail to check-auth@verifier.port25.com to get your spam results.

 

[Maniaman]

We had issues with our web server and gmail in the past. From what we could find, there's no good way to get removed from the blacklist other than time. It took over a month for Gmail to un-blacklist us, where pretty much every other blacklist was fixed in 1-2 days.

 

[papuchazo]

1. Do you have SPF and DKIM set up on the mail server? (check the DNS TXT records if you're not sure)
2. Are you using DMARC to get feedback from mail providers that flag your messages as spam?

In a nutshell:

• SPF verifies to the receiver that the server you send from is allowed to send e-mail for your domain.
• DKIM does something very similar, but it also signs the message cryptographically, making it more authoritative.
Using these two tools, your e-mails are much less likely to be marked as spam. They also prevent other spam servers from forging e-mails as if they’re from your domain (and getting your “from” domain name blacklisted) when sending to other people.

“DMARC”, also configured as a TXT in your DNS, will send you the results of e-mails sent with envelopes from your domains on a daily basis back to you to tell you whether or not your e-mails were marked as spam, and of any forgeries of your from domain.

It lets you monitor the success rates for e-mails you (or your customers) send to their clients.

You'll also want to make sure that you're not set up as an open relay by mistake and that e-mails are all authenticated by extension.

A great tool for checking if everything is set up properly, and whether or not your e-mail looks spammy: send an e-mail to check-auth@verifier.port25.com to get your spam results.

I did setup SPF. I never knew about DMARC, sounds very interesting. I'll research it further. Thanks for that verifier email, should prove useful!

We had issues with our web server and gmail in the past. From what we could find, there's no good way to get removed from the blacklist other than time. It took over a month for Gmail to un-blacklist us, where pretty much every other blacklist was fixed in 1-2 days.

Same experience here.