Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

AOL Bans Mail From DSL-Hosted Servers

Posted by timothy on from the because-individuals-should-not-have-them dept.

kmself writes "As first reported at linux-elitists by Aaron Sherman, and with a demonstration of the denial at zIWETHEY, AOL has begun blocking mailservers identified with residential DSL lines as an anti-spam measure, apparently heedless of the huge collateral damage this move imposes (and guess who can't send mail to Mom...). This action was unannounced, and has received virtually no coverage, spare an oblique mention at News.com. It also violates SMTP RFCs, as Aaron points out, not to mention the 'good neighbor' conventions of Internet communications. Mail to AOL's postmaster is also bounced -- this is RFC-ignorant. I strongly recommend that as a compensatory measure, non-AOL MTAs be configured to deny all incoming mail from AOL's domain."

3 of 882 comments (clear)

  1. bouncing mail to postmaster? by fyonn · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I thought that was a requirement of having a domain and you can lose the domain if mail is not accepted or read there? I'd have to check the rfc's but wouldn;t that be a thing, someone taking aol's domain from them because they don;t accept mail for postmaster?

    dave

  2. No problem by JanneM · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I long ago includedevery mail from aol.com, yahoo.com and hotmail.com in my static spam filters. If anybody with such an account wants to mail me, they need to get in touch with some other account (or other means) first so I can add an excemption to them. To date I have three such excemptions total, all on yahoo.com.

    I can't very well block them further than I already do, in other words.

    --
    Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
  3. Eathlink does this too. by statusbar · · Score: 5, Interesting

    My friend pays for a "static" Ip address on his cable modem to run some private corporate web forums. A few weeks ago, all email notifications from the forums going to anyone hosted at earthlink.net were bouncing - The message is "No email accepted from dynamic IP addresses".
    Both AOL and Earthlink have TONS of subscribers.

    If they both decide to carry on doing this, there is nothing you can do about it.

    Truth is, SMTP sucks. They are only doing this because of all the spam. Yes they are violating RFC's. Too bad...

    --jeff++

    --
    ipv6 is my vpn