[MlMt] Selecting default SMTP server

[Antonio Leding]

“… surely using mail submission (port 587 or 465…”

With SES, most definitely - but not a big deal…if my own server, can 
literally use any port I want…

“…mandatory TLS encryption and authentication and DKIM signatures 
added with "d=amazonses.com”)…”

Most definitely - just prudent…

“…published a SPF record in DNS for leding.net which explicitly 
declares that your mail may legitimately be coming out of SES…”

Again, very true - which is exactly what people should be doing - at 
least with their own domains.  I know some may opt to not use SPF but 
given that more and more admins are requiring SPF checks for all inbound 
mail, just foolish not to have it…

- - -

On 24 Jul 2021, at 20:59, Bill Cole wrote:

> On 2021-07-24 at 23:03:04 UTC-0400 (Sun, 25 Jul 2021 03:03:04 +0000)
> Antonio Leding <mailmate at lists.freron.com>
> is rumored to have said:
>
>> “…not feasible to send mail claiming to be from a particular 
>> address through any arbitrarily chosen mail server…”
>>
>> Mostly true but there’s ways around such hindrances…
>>
>> https://www.wpoven.com/blog/free-smtp-servers-sending-emails/
>
> All of those require you to set up accounts with the providers in 
> question. For example, you cannot simply decide to route your mail 
> through Google's mail servers without having a Google account and 
> configuring it to allow you to send mail using that account with 
> sender addresses that are not hosted at Google.
>
> So: not quite "arbitrarily chosen."
>
>>
>> I haven’t used any of my “assigned” SMTP servers since 2000.  
>> And since 2013, been using a combo of Amazon’s SES or my own 
>> Postfix…the latter is especially nice if one wants to use a 
>> non-standard port...
>
> Sure, but you are almost surely using mail submission (port 587 or 
> 465, with mandatory TLS encryption and authentication and DKIM 
> signatures added with "d=amazonses.com") and you have published a SPF 
> record in DNS for leding.net which explicitly declares that your mail 
> may legitimately be coming out of SES.
>
> Back before spam was a problem, it was possible to submit mail without 
> authentication through nearly all SMTP servers, using whatever 
> envelope sender and/or From address you felt like using with any 
> server. This has evolved over time to the current situation where 
> authentication (and hence server-specific account setup) is almost 
> universally required along with TLS encryption. Some mail clients 
> (including, at least in the past, Apple Mail) have configured 
> submission (i.e. SMTP-like) servers independently of IMAP accounts and 
> allowed users to arbitrarily select which outbound path to use with 
> each message, regardless of which sender address is used. That is not 
> generally safe today, but it was once entirely reasonable.
>
>
>> - - -
>>
>> On 24 Jul 2021, at 19:47, Bill Cole wrote:
>>
>>> On 2021-07-24 at 21:15:55 UTC-0400 (Sat, 24 Jul 2021 18:15:55 -0700)
>>> Ralph Alvy <mailmate at lists.freron.com>
>>> is rumored to have said:
>>>
>>>> If I have more than one Source Acct, how do I tell Mailmate with 
>>>> SMTP server to use for outgoing mail?
>>>
>>> Each account has its own exclusive SMTP Server settings. This is 
>>> good because on the modern Internet, it is not feasible to send mail 
>>> claiming to be from a particular address through any arbitrarily 
>>> chosen mail server. It might work, but more likely your mail would 
>>> be rejected or worse: dropped silently.
>
>
>
> -- 
> Bill Cole
> bill at scconsult.com or billcole at apache.org
> (AKA @grumpybozo and many *@billmail.scconsult.com addresses)
> Not Currently Available For Hire
> _______________________________________________
> mailmate mailing list
> mailmate at lists.freron.com
> https://lists.freron.com/listinfo/mailmate
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