Mail server blacklisted

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Mail server blacklisted

andrewsmd

3:11 pm on Feb 1, 2011 (gmt 0)

Wasn't really for sure where to put this. We moved our mail server to a new machine. I had forgotten to add the reverse dns records to it for a few days. We ended up getting blacklisted on tiopan.com. I've personally never heard of this but aol and comcast are blacklisting us and this is the only rbl I can find that we are on. I do have reverse dns set up properly and dnsstuff says our server is fine. However, comcast is still blocking us. I tried contacting people at that site, but it looks like it was built by a 14 year old. I really have no idea how I can get us off of there. Does anyone know anything about that specific rbl?

wheel

3:28 pm on Feb 1, 2011 (gmt 0)

I was blacklisted by comcast years ago for no other reason than I did email forwarding for hosting clients - bounced all their emails to their comcast account.

Call, they'd whitelist me. A week later, blacklisted again. Call, they'd whitelist me. A week later...etc.

I eventually just told clients to use a different internet service provider. Sorry, don't have any suggestions other than to try and call them on the phone.

andrewsmd

3:40 pm on Feb 1, 2011 (gmt 0)

I was afraid that was the answer. The problem I have is while I understand that, most of our clients don't. I've never been a fan of blaming someone else, even when it is their fault. I'm a solution man, not a band aid man. I'll see what I can figure out.

andrewsmd

3:45 pm on Feb 1, 2011 (gmt 0)

One thing I don't understand is the rbl I'm on is obviously a poorly ran business if I can't even get a hold of anyone there. How can a company as big as comcast consider it a valid rbl...

Hoople

1:18 am on Feb 3, 2011 (gmt 0)

Is your IP in a Netblock marked as 'Portable' ie in a dial up range? Comcast, many F100's and a few Tier 1 ISP's won't accept mail from any portable/dial up range.

Check your IP on [mxtoolbox.com ] This test will check a mail server IP address against 147 DNS based email blacklists. Whitelisting on the recipient end is sometimes the only option for those lists with no reasonable removal process.

As an email admin by day I suggest you do more than just the reverse dns. That was enough in 2006-2007, the spammers have got that covered since then too. Add to the dns SenderID/Domain Keys and SPF records. There has been no harm in doing both SenderID/Domain Keys and SPF IMHO.

The best of the online SPF record checkers is [kitterman.com ] There are others but they give confusing results (IMHO) and/or false errors. openspf.org has lots of backing docs if you are curious.

Some SPAM blacklists will list you if your server banner (greeting) doesn't match your domain. On a shared server this may not be configurable. You then may find some relief by listing it as a secondary MX record (in addition to citing its IP in your SenderID/DK/SPF config)

Hoople

1:35 am on Feb 3, 2011 (gmt 0)

One thing I don't understand is the rbl I'm on is obviously a poorly ran business if I can't even get a hold of anyone there. How can a company as big as comcast consider it a valid rbl...

See [postmaster.comcast.net ]

andrewsmd

3:08 pm on Feb 3, 2011 (gmt 0)

That's great information. I've kind of been thrown into the webmaster role handling hosting, email, development, scoping, and outsourcing management so I'm somewhat new to all of this.