OT: Mail servers changes (INFO) - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

28 Feb 2000

On Feb 28, 19:49, Jay West wrote:
...
  Pete wrote....
 > My ISP runs two SMTP mail servers, one open, the other not; 
...
  Open relays have NOTHING to do with the above
situation - talk about
 throwing the baby out with the bathwater - the above scenario is akin to
 saying "gee, I want to allow http through my firewall, so lets just open the
...
  firewall up for all ports and all services to and from
anywhere". 
Well, maybe, which is why the European ISPs (and mine in particular) are
looking for another method.  As more and more sites use MAPS or other
services, the need for a better solution becomes greater.

...
  There are two other much more "standard"
methods of allowing the above.
 First, the user could still check his email at his original/local provider
...
  via pop or imap, 
they do that anyway -- *receiving* mail isn't part of the problem.

...
  and he could send mail from the smtp server at his
 nonlocal/traveling provider. 
But it would have the "wrong" address, and lots of people can't seem to
cope with that.

...
  Second, any time an ISP sets up an agreement
 with another ISP to let their users roam, they could just add the roaming
 ISP's domain name to their sendmail.cw file to allow relaying from that
 domain only. 
Agreed, but we're talking about hundreds of ISPs, not just a few.  And for
reasons I've never really understood, quite a number of European ISPs,
including one of the biggest UK providers, don't provide DNS PTR records
for their dialups (so authentication is more difficult).

I'm not personally advocating the use of open relays, BTW.  The servers I
help manage are not open, because we were hit a long time ago.  I'm merely
pointing out an instance where a bunch of ISPs have seen them as an interim
solution -- and issue warnings to roaming users that some of their mail may
bounce because recipient servers may block them.

-- 

Pete						Peter Turnbull
						Dept. of Computer Science
						University of York