Lazy network operators

Wed Apr 14 08:00:44 UTC 2004

>>>>> "Iljitsch" == Iljitsch van Beijnum <iljitsch at muada.com> writes:

 Iljitsch> I understand your frustration, but the approach of blocking
 Iljitsch> port 25 isn't the right one.

As a generalization this is inevitably false - there are networks where
blocking port 25 is absolutely the right approach, and networks where it
is not.

 Iljitsch> It may be convenient for you, but there are plenty of
 Iljitsch> people who have good reasons for using other SMTP servers
 Iljitsch> than their access provider's ones.

For these people there is port 587.

Using port 25 for smarthosting needs to die (arguably it is already
dead, it just hasn't stopped moving yet). Port 25 is for sending mail
to the recipient's MX host. Port 587 is for sending mail to the
sender's smarthost. The policy requirements and abuse characteristics
of the two types of services are sufficiently different that trying to
treat them as the same, even though they happen to be using the same
underlying protocol, is just going to cause pain.

-- 
Andrew, Supernews
http://www.supernews.com