DKIM, DMARC, SPF, rDNS/PTR, EHLO… all correct and verified in the email “original source,” BY GOOGLE. Still goes to SPAM folder because **** you, apparently. I hate Google.
DKIM, DMARC, SPF, rDNS/PTR, EHLO… all correct and verified in the email “original source,” BY GOOGLE. Still goes to SPAM folder because **** you, apparently. I hate Google.
How’s your self hosted email going? Any advice you can share to avoid some of the issues described?
I’ve run a mail server since the late 90s. I gave up running my own outbound years ago. Whether it gets received is too inconsistent. Primarily, make sure the IP you use isn’t on any spam lists. If it is, get a new IP or try to submit appeals. Make sure you have the standard anti spam/authenticity measures implemented (they’re listed in the OP).
These are the minimum. Years ago it was enough to have reasonable delivery. Unfortunately these aren’t that helpful anymore because spammers also set them up (often with seemingly randomly generated domain names). I assume because not having them was a fairly strong signal for being a spammer, so now they also set them up, which also means there’s not really any configuration / setup you can do to seem legitimate (aside from mail volume and the content itself which will be analyzed).
Anyway running your own SMTP itself is easy. The problem is getting your mail to the inbox or at least spam/junk folder (your mail may get blackholed and not even show up in spam). At least when you get a rejection, you know something is wrong, but many times the receiving server will indicate a success code and simply not deliver it to the user (not even to their spam).
Interesting! You said you gave up on the outbound, does that mean you can’t reply to mails you receive? But if you can reply, does that mean the sender (let’s assume someone with gmail) will get it or would even that likely end up blackholed or in spam?
I can reply yo emails. It’s what jaybone said – I use a 3rd party outbound (SMTP).
I use Thunderbird as my mail client. In there you can define multiple IMAP/pop accounts (inbound) and multiple SMTP (outbound). So when I click reply, the SMTP I have set for that email address is a 3rd party service that sends emails using my domain.
This does have a privacy implication, so whether that’s appropriate for you is for you to decide. The 3rd party can read and save a copy of your outbound email inclusive of any content included with it (like the email you’re replying to if you include it).
Ah nice, that is a great idea. I will try this out, thanks!
What 3rd party service do you use?
Don’t take this as an endorsement as it’s not really intended to be used for this purpose and I’m probably going to switch, but I’ve been using sendgrid for a few years as I was familiar with it from business use. I was using mandrill before that until they changed their pricing and some other things.
EDIT: also worth mentioning I have a grandfathered free plan.
Good for you if you have a grandfathered account, but Sendgrid has a terrible interface. Setting up things is so messed up!
Again, not an endorsement, but Qboxmail is nice and EU-based.
Maybe they send emails using someone else’s smtp server? (Like some paid service that provides smtp?)
@toxicmode @galoisghost I think those of us who can should selfhost an email address at least to contact other selfhosters even if we can’t use it effectively to contact users of Big Email. That’s how the network effect begins
Think of it like how a lot of the Fedi defederated from Gab or/and Thereads, except that this time it’s Big email that’s forcing the defederation
https://badrihippo.thekambattu.rocks/clog/staying-away-from-big-email/
Stop tempting me! I might do it.
One question, I currently use proton mail to use my domain for email and there are no issues afaik. Do you think a few years of using proton will have “whitelisted” my domain enough or will all the issues pop up once I change to hosting it myself?