Mail Delivery System

*di_bear* · 09-19-2008, 07:15 PM

I just received over 60 Mail Delivery System/MAILER DAEMON messages. Just to clear it up, I have a personal web site, so I send out ZERO emails that aren't to people I know personally. So, I'm wondering why I just got these. How do I remedy this? Do I have to delete the email box and create a new one? (I might do that anyway since some horrible spam morons got a hold of my email address.)

*Buck* · 09-19-2008, 07:17 PM

If someone you've sent mail to has had their e-mail address or e-mail client compromised, someone probably got your e-mail address from there.

*di_bear* · 09-19-2008, 07:20 PM

How they got my email address isn't the issue. How do I prevent someone from spamming with my email address? I don't exactly want to deal with consequences that someone else brought about. I'm also not too happy about getting 60+ failure message.

*Melissa* · 09-19-2008, 07:23 PM

Hi,

More than likely this is just a result of someone forging the From address in emails to make it appear as though they're being sent from your email address which results in you receiving the bounce messages... If so, the emails are not being sent through your account and deleting the email account will not prevent this...

There really isn't anything that can be done to prevent spammers from forging your address, however some site owners have chosen to add mailer-daemon@* and postmaster@* to their SpamAssassin blacklists to reduce the number of bounces they receive. Please note that doing so will also block valid bounces.

Please also see the following for more information:
http://www.aota.net/forums/showthread.php?t=24096
http://www.aota.net/forums/showthread.php?t=23860
http://service.FutureQuest.net/kb99

*Jeff* · 09-19-2008, 07:25 PM

You may find yourself getting a lot more than 60 -- it's not uncommon now to suddenly get joejob / blowback email from a spammer forging your address as the return path / from address in the thousands. THe worst I saw was a friend who got 10,000 returned messages in one day through no fault of his own (he didn't send any of the messages nor were they even sent from the USA, but his address was forged as the return-path for any non-deliverables.)

As a temporary solution you might try this (not knowing the specifics of what you're seeing, but guessing that it might be the same as what I've seen recently)
http://www.aota.net/forums/showthrea...924#post161924

The concentrated blowback usually blows over in a day or two.

*di_bear* · 09-19-2008, 07:47 PM

Ok, just so I don't do anything stupid ;-) , is this all I need to do?

*Andilinks* · 09-19-2008, 09:56 PM

I solved the problem by blacklisting " mailer-daemon@*.* "

If you don't mind missing possible legitimate messages from mailer-daemon, it works.

*sheila* · 09-21-2008, 10:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Andilinks

I solved the problem by blacklisting " mailer-daemon@*.* "

If you don't mind missing possible legitimate messages from mailer-daemon, it works.

For this method, we would also suggest considering blacklisting email from
postmaster@*.* as well.

By the way, if it wasn't clear, the screen showing the blacklisting is in the SpamAssassin filter setup. You would want to use SpamAssassin to implement this particular method.

*Andilinks* · 09-21-2008, 12:39 PM

Quote:

For this method, we would also suggest considering blacklisting email from
postmaster@*.* as well.

I only blocked "mailer-daemon" because that was the only one that was clogging my inbox with hundreds of return messages. It has been some months since that happened so I probably could even unblock that address. The drawback to blocking these is that you'll never know if one of your own messages doesn't get through. Since I am only using this email account to answer website inquiries I figure that any inquiry that uses a bad address is probably a spam inquiry anyway.

It is a quick and uncomplicated way to stop the deluge.