Verizon.net Finally Moving Email To Port 587

The Washington Post's Security Fix blog is reporting that Verizon, long identified as the largest ISP source of spam, is moving to require use of the submission port, 587, in outbound mail — and thus to require authentication. While spammers may still be able to relay spam through zombies in Verizon's network, if the victims let their mail clients remember their authentication credentials, at least the zombies will be easily identifiable. Verizon pledges to clean up their zombie problem quickly. We'll see.

Comments

Re:Do zombies even use ISP mail servers?

[stevey]

Indeed.

But if you're the ISP you can just say "Hey customers outgoing port 25 is blocked - use authentication and port 587 to send mail".

In general I'm against ISP blocking services, but in the case of spam prevention its a good choice to make.

(The ideal would be to allow outgoing, but cut people off if they spam. That would punish only the guilty, but I guess they're not so keen on that).

Re:Do zombies even use ISP mail servers?

[Chabo]

In general I'm against monitoring people secretly and continuously; but in the case of cities where children are legally or physically possibly present, it's a good choice to make to stop pedophiles.

... what?

Remembering credentials?!

[coljac]

I like the suggestion that people are somehow lax in security because their mail client remembers their password. Who are these guys who type the password in every 3 minutes when they check their mail?

Re:Do zombies even use ISP mail servers?

[robot_love]

He's saying that a losing a little bit of liberty to gain some safety isn't worth it. He did this by cleverly rewording the original poster's statement about email to make it about pedophiles to highlight the fact it's essentially the same issue, simply in a different context.

Completely pointless?

[MikeBabcock]

In my opinion, the transition to port 587 is nearly pointless. I already use authentication on port 25 to identify customers.

And according to one of the only people I'd trust on SMTP issues, "the SUBMIT specification has several fundamental flaws that make compliance practically impossible. I advise against all use of port 587" -- djb.