Kitz Forum
Announcements => Site Announcements => Topic started by: kitz on October 07, 2017, 10:39:09 AM
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A heads up that email notifications to any of the following domains are being bounced
@live.com
@outlook.com
@hotmail.com
This is affecting the registration confirmation for new forum members and notifications for subscribed topics & personal messages.
I'm not quite sure why as it doesn't appear to be specific to my server. All the usual blacklist checks on both the domain name and server IP are clean.
I've contacted my hosts who advised me that they think its Microsoft's 'Smart Filter' being over-zealous as they've had hundreds of others seeing the same issue and quote "I doubt its only with us". They are awaiting a response from Microsoft in an attempt to sort this.
In the meantime I'm manually activating new registrations for those accounts which appear to be genuine with known UK ISP IP addresses, but it does mean those using an outlook.com etc email address won't receive the automated welcome email.
*** Update. Issue resolved 08-10-17. Mail now being delivered. ***
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Brilliant. This is what Microsoft say :mad:
We have reviewed your IP and determined that messages are being filtered based on the recommendations of the SmartScreen® Filter. Email filtering is based on many factors, but primarily it's due to mail content and recipient interaction with that mail.
Because of the proprietary nature of SmartScreen® and because SmartScreen® Filter technology is always adapting and learning more about what is and isn't unwanted mail, it is not possible for us to offer specific advice about improving your mail content. However, in general SmartScreen® Filter evaluates specific words or characteristics from each e-mail message and weights them, based on their likelihood to indicate that a message is unwanted or legitimate mail.
Unfortunately, after reviewing the information you provided and in compliance with our mail policies, we are unable to offer immediate mitigation for your deliverability issue.
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I've no idea what that means, but reading between the lines could this occur if someone subscribes to a load of topics, then just bins then when they get them.
I now have no way of re-earning my SNDS reputation, because no mail will be delivered. What a stupid system. Trying to research this and I am far from alone.
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A system that's intended to protect users ends up penalising innocent people. Great. :wall:
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I'm not best pleased because there seems no way of reversing this.
Not only does it affect forum mail but because its IP based, also main site mail and my personal mail.
I've been firing out mail between my hosts, jumping through hoops and trying to research SNDS & JMRP but its looking like there's nothing much further I can do.
Last email about to go back to my hosts in an attempt with them to plead again to MS, but other than that Im not sure what else I can do.
If any active members have registered with the above email addresses from the above domains can you please turn off any subscriptions, because for the time being this is only making matters worse. :(
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I've no idea what that means, but reading between the lines could this occur if someone subscribes to a load of topics, then just bins then when they get them.
I think it means it's reading the content of the email and deciding whether it is spam or not, in conjunction with what the user does with it. Hows its supposed to learn if nobody can tell it when its wrong I don't know.
I often just delete notifications that a thread has been updated, as once I've seen the email I often just go to my browser and look at the unread posts, rather than open another browser tab by clicking the link in the email.
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I've noticed this happening more and more with outlook / hotmail in general.
I've subscribed to a few newsletters and a couple of them which I dont open very often after reading the subject line keeps getting put in to the junk mail. The emails I get from GOG keep doing this. I keep saying its not junk. But after 2 or 3 further emails i find them back in the junk section again. It's very annoying.
I bet this is catching a lot of people. But more noticable in smaller groups with email notifications.
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Most of the stuff its bouncing is subscriptions
This is a typical one, but I notice there's a couple of password resets and people trying to sign up too.
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The message I get is this
A message that you sent could not be delivered to one or more of its recipients. This is a permanent error. The following address(es) failed:
user@outlook.com
host outlook-com.olc.protection.outlook.com [65.54.188.94]
SMTP error from remote mail server after pipelined MAIL FROM:<kitz.co.uk> SIZE=2629:
550 SC-001 (BAY004-MC2F10) Unfortunately, messages weren't sent.
The ban is definitely IP specific. I do not send out spam. My host have checked mail logs - volume is low and quote "we werent able to encounter any suspicious mail influx from your IP" which they have told MS. I am not on any blacklists anywhere and its purely down to their stupid system.
Ohhhhhh as I type Ive just got a reply back from my rant to Vidahost. Get this
Recently Microsoft introduced a new system called SNDS, it's a smart filter that filters IPs based on some algorithms which are not disclaimed by Microsoft. Unfortunately, the SNDS system is not without it's flaws, every provider is complaining of issues with it without any actual reasons behind it.
/snip/
the IP is already added to SNDS and there are no DATA. Where there is no DATA it means Microsoft have no reasons to block the IP.
I'll chase the issue further with them
:wall: :wall: :wall:
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I often just delete notifications that a thread has been updated, as once I've seen the email I often just go to my browser and look at the unread posts, rather than open another browser tab by clicking the link in the email.
I think thats what quite a lot of people do, yet their smart filter determines based on what actions you perform upon receiving the mail. I can also imagine because the mail will have a link in, that will also give it minus points :(
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I've noticed this happening more and more with outlook / hotmail in general.
I've subscribed to a few newsletters and a couple of them which I dont open very often after reading the subject line keeps getting put in to the junk mail. The emails I get from GOG keep doing this. I keep saying its not junk. But after 2 or 3 further emails i find them back in the junk section again. It's very annoying.
I bet this is catching a lot of people. But more noticable in smaller groups with email notifications.
Yes it will be something to do with the SNDS system they use. I had already registered as a safe sender via my hosts, but that made no difference either.
I certainly am not alone - as mentioned my hosts said hundreds* and thats just them. There are plenty of other complaints out there too.
With the number of complaints, its not a very smart system.
*That could perhaps be a high figure for those who are on shared hosting whereby many domains will send mail from the 1 IP. So you may have many people complaining from just one IP.
My server has its own IP so it should be pretty easy for them to see my mail volume & identify that my server is not being used to spam.
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It does sound like a stupid system, I can think of many circumstances that would catch it out.
Every day I receive a new mail at my gmail account, sent from a backup script on my own Linux box, saying “Backup completed OK”. If I fail to receive it then I would investigate why my back up had failed. But the body of the message is of little interest (and always very similar), so as long as I receive it, I usually just delete it and get on with my day. Never occurred to me some twit might be deducing that I didn’t want them delivered any more. :(
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It is very short sighted on MS's part, I get lot's of emails, I'll check the subject line and often delete them, if it's something that interests me then I'll open it. Many people probably do this, just because it's deleted without being read does not mean it's spam!
Given time and enough complaints I'm sure they'll do something about it, but we all know how slowly MS can react.
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From a few minutes googling, the whole SNDS implementation does seem to be a complete disaster, and everybody’s head is buried in the sand.
Imagine you are at a conference in a work capacity. A prospect seems interested, and hands you a business card with an email that reads “hotmail.com”.
You then have a choice... do you warn the prospect that your email might not get delivered? If you do, chances are he’ll form a certain opinion of your organisation, and run a mile. If you don’t warn him, chances are he’ll get fed up waiting, and move on anyway.
Verging on conspiracy theory, but makes me wonder... Is it just possible there might be a door about to open, whereby hotmail delivery will work reliably again, providing a certain subscription is paid, notionally for something like ‘validation of mail sender’?
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Wondered why I wasn't getting any notifications on my outlook account, have now changed email to a different non MS account.
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Hi
I think part of the issue is kitz does not send enough email to be scored on reputation.
I could be wrong sorry and time is short, but please see 2 pics, so I think this maybe not an issue to the bigger ISP/ESP, but rather a means to stop spam from the smaller users
Many thanks
John
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Finally! Microsoft have done what they said they can't/won't and agreed to mitigate my IP.
We have confirmed that your IP is eligible for temporary mitigation based on our mail policies. Please note: The mitigation process may take 24 - 48 hours to replicate completely throughout our system.
It's been a wee bit of a battle, but thanks to my hosts who challenged them repeatedly on my behalf.. especially after doing a detailed JMRP report and finding that no data was held against my server. This means that Microsoft has absolutely no negative data from my server and therefore it should not have been on their block list.
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I think part of the issue is kitz does not send enough email to be scored on reputation.
Thanks John, perhaps it may play a small part, I guess they use various indicators. FYI this is what they said in the email today
Email filtering is based on many factors, but primarily it's due to mail content and recipient interaction with that mail. Because of the proprietary nature of SmartScreen® and because SmartScreen® Filter technology is always adapting and learning more about what is and isn't unwanted mail, it is not possible for us to offer specific advice about improving your mail content. However, in general SmartScreen® Filter evaluates specific words or characteristics from each e-mail message and weights them, based on their likelihood to indicate that a message is unwanted or legitimate mail.
I have a hotmail account that goes back about 20yrs and I logged into it out of curiosity. My junk mail folder was full of genuine subscription mails from other tech forums... including twitter. I moved some twitter notifications to my regular inbox and marked them not junk, but several hours later twitter is still going to junk mail.
I've also marked a couple of other forum mail as not spam, but its too early yet to report if hotmail takes any notice.
As a test I sent myself an email from the kitz domain to my hotmail account and mail is now going through.. but straight into junk. I've marked as not junk.. but another mail still automatically went to junk. It does seem a rather backwards way of dealing with spam. Yet my inbox had a pile of mails offering me viagra or credit checks which had got through. ::)
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Wondered why I wasn't getting any notifications on my outlook account, have now changed email to a different non MS account.
Do me a favour please to help me earn a wee bit of cred with their stupid system. I'll send you an email in a minute to your outlook account.. it will probably go straight to your spam folder. Can you dig it out and mark 'not spam'.
Cheers
*I know the address, because I know you were one of those affected by the bounces.
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I have an Outlook account I didn't realise existed. You can bombard that if you like and I'll open them all and keep for a while. :)
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From a few minutes googling, the whole SNDS implementation does seem to be a complete disaster, and everybody’s head is buried in the sand.
Imagine you are at a conference in a work capacity. A prospect seems interested, and hands you a business card with an email that reads “hotmail.com”.
You then have a choice... do you warn the prospect that your email might not get delivered? If you do, chances are he’ll form a certain opinion of your organisation, and run a mile. If you don’t warn him, chances are he’ll get fed up waiting, and move on anyway.
Verging on conspiracy theory, but makes me wonder... Is it just possible there might be a door about to open, whereby hotmail delivery will work reliably again, providing a certain subscription is paid, notionally for something like ‘validation of mail sender’?
After googling myself, I saw instances where people had missed out on job offers for precisely this reason. I hadn't realised just how wide-spread the problem was and there are lots of complaints. Several people on the official microsoft forums have abandoned outlook and gone to gmail because of it. There's also lots of complaints about innocent domain holders being blocked, including a few others also blocked despite having no negative data in their JMRP report.
In all honesty and from what I've seen, it looks like I have been very lucky for them to mitigate my IP as its seldom they do this. I have no doubt that I could have done it on my own without my hosts dealing with them direct on my behalf.
Thanks also to d2d4j for kindly offering a temporary solution, even if I didn't need to take up the offer in the end. TBH if it happens again I may just leave it.... and do what Ive seen several other forum users doing and that's refusing to allow new members to use the MS domains during registration due to this being so problematic. :/
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I have an Outlook account I didn't realise existed. You can bombard that if you like and I'll open them all and keep for a while. :)
Cheers. If you PM me with the address I'll fire off a couple of emails to you.
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Sorry ... done.
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Do me a favour please to help me earn a wee bit of cred with their stupid system. I'll send you an email in a minute to your outlook account.. it will probably go straight to your spam folder. Can you dig it out and mark 'not spam'.
Cheers
*I know the address, because I know you were one of those affected by the bounces.
I have received two mails from the Kitz site, both went to my Inbox without touching Spam.
*Windows 10 Mail app.
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Finally! Microsoft have done what they said they can't/won't and agreed to mitigate my IP.
Excellent result I suspect, on the grand scale of things. I remain dubious about the merits of SNDS and it’s a pity some obviously valid stuff still goes to junk, from kitz and hundreds of other domains.
But in the interests of not rocking boats etc, maybe better to just reflect positively on the fact that a company the size of Microsoft has sat down and looked at kitz.co.uk and clearly recognised her contributions and validity. :)
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Hi
Glad it’s been resolved and kudos to kitz and vidahost.
I think it’s important here to state that email is not a guaranteed medium of delivery. However, it seems more and more that users believe it is. It is not.
Also, running email servers require constant work to ensure high deliverability
Spam control is constantly fluid, and the bad people who want to send spam, are aware of most measures to stop it, so they keep adapting.
@7lm - Microsoft measures which caught kitz, sounds like a good system, but needs to evolve before been pushed higher up the filters for defence of spam.
Virgin media had a similar issue a few months ago, not the same but had issues greylisting which caught a lot of ISP/ESP out. However, I was one of the admins who reported the issue and helped to change their filter by providing log details/testing externally so it was more reliable.
@kitz - now you have been added to whitelist, subject to your server not been compromised and mass mail been sent, you should no longer have issues in MS mail been accepted but it is still possible to be sent to spam folder of recipients, as everything is fluid I think most sites now state to check their spam folder if email not received
There’s more but it goes off topic
Many thanks and sorry for the long post
John
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msn.com is also hotmail
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Sorry ... done.
Thanks vic. Sorry got distracted by something else that needed doing last night, but hopefully you should have mail from both forum and main site.
I have received two mails from the Kitz site, both went to my Inbox without touching Spam.
Excellent :)
Do me a favour please and just reply 'got it' or something. I dont know if it actually will do anything, but seeing as they say "recipient interaction with that mail" there's a chance that it will be classed as a positive interaction.
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Excellent result I suspect, on the grand scale of things. I remain dubious about the merits of SNDS and it’s a pity some obviously valid stuff still goes to junk, from kitz and hundreds of other domains.
TBH I think I could have perhaps lived with junk mail status as much bigger sites than me are also experiencing the same issue.. but actually blocking mail was way too extreme - especially as I was entirely innocent.
But in the interests of not rocking boats etc, maybe better to just reflect positively on the fact that a company the size of Microsoft has sat down and looked at kitz.co.uk and clearly recognised her contributions and validity. :)
Whilst they likely will have done a quick review of the site, it wont have harmed either that right on the front page there was an article about the problems ;)
I doubt that they consider the site that important, but in all honesty it looks like some form of cock up with their system. They didn't have a leg to stand on really when even their own JMRP report showed nothing negative against my IP.
msn.com is also hotmail
ahh forgot about that one as it was only the other 3 I'd seen bounced mails for.
I don't usually monitor any incoming mail on the forum account as its either usually spam or people accidentally responding to PMs by mail. That mail account is only used by the SMF forum software to send out registration mails, PM notifications and topic subscriptions. I only spotted it because I became suspicious with a new member having difficulty registering, plus there was also something else odd a few days ago with another member signing up, that I looked further.
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@kitz - now you have been added to whitelist, subject to your server not been compromised and mass mail been sent, you should no longer have issues in MS mail been accepted but it is still possible to be sent to spam folder of recipients, as everything is fluid I think most sites now state to check their spam folder if email not received
Not sure what they mean about 'mitigated' but it doesn't quite sound like a white list - I took it more to be a reversal of previous decision, and scrub the slate clean. That's why I think I need to build up rep again. They did warn that stuff could still end up in junk if thats how their sensors detected the content. I think because it contains links that is seen as negative, but there's nothing I can do about that.
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Hi kitz
Sorry I may not have explained too well sorry
I think the mitigation (or whitelist), is to add your ip and domain possibly, to an exception list for that particular filter, so it does not take any action (good or bad)
We sometimes do this type of exception if there is good reason and we never want any actions taken on either an IP address, domain or email address.
I hope that explains a little better sorry but I could be entirely wrong sorry. It just seems to me that MS will not stop the filter but make changes to it as it goes along. The exceptions can be added on a manual basis if needed
Many thanks
John
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Thanks vic. Sorry got distracted by something else that needed doing last night, but hopefully you should have mail from both forum and main site.
Emails from both accounts received ok into the INBOX. Reply sent.
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for reference I have had to multiple times needed to use the outlook/hotmail form to prevent issues, so I know the feeling. Microsoft's email filters are some of the worst I have seen in the business, I have to disable them in outlook office client as well due to the sheer amount of false positives even on their low filtering setting.
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Excellent :)
Do me a favour please and just reply 'got it' or something. I dont know if it actually will do anything, but seeing as they say "recipient interaction with that mail" there's a chance that it will be classed as a positive interaction.
Done!
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I think the mitigation (or whitelist), is to add your ip and domain possibly, to an exception list for that particular filter, so it does not take any action (good or bad)
We sometimes do this type of exception if there is good reason and we never want any actions taken on either an IP address, domain or email address.
Thanks for the explanation. It was probably me having a slow on the uptake day, today :)