Mailerdaemon Failure Notice

[pastafreak]

I just sent an email to two different addresses. One failed,and I got this message...

"[the [email protected]]
Remote host said: 550 SC-001 (COL0-MC1-F45) Unfortunately, messages from(my isp address) weren't sent. Please contact your Internet service provider since part of their network is on our block list. You can also refer your provider to http://mail.live.com/mail/troubleshootin"
Whose block list?...and why?

[Buenchico]

Many firms and email services use filters which are designed to block spam. One of the ways that they do so is by detecting the IP addresses of spammers and blocking mail from those addresses.

In some cases it's a single IP address which gets blocked. Since most ISPs allocate addresses 'dynamically' (i.e. by assigning a new IP address every time you connect to the internet) the solution is simple; all you need to do is to disconnect your router from your phone line, wait a few seconds and then reconnect it. You'll then have a new IP address which (hopefully) won't be blocked at the receiving end.

However such filtering systems sometimes decide that so much spam is coming from a particular ISP (or other email service) that ALL incoming mail from that service is blocked by the filter.

In particular, many US email services seem to employ filters which block all emails from many UK ISPs. (Virgin Media seems to get hit particularly hard by such filters, with many subscribers experiencing difficulties in contacting email addresses in the USA). Similarly some UK ISPs have a nasty habit of blocking all incoming mail from certain US ISPs (which they associate with heavy volumes of mail).

If you experience such problems you can only
(a) contact your email service provider to advise them of the problem (in the hope that they'll seek to reduce the amount of outgoing spam, thus getting their services removed from the 'blocked lists' of other providers ;
OR
(b) create a new email account with a different service provider (such as Gmail or GMX) in the hope that your new email address won't also be on a 'blocked list'.

I used to have a friend in the USA who repeatedly found that my emails (sent through a well-respected UK ISP) were blocked by his ISP. I had to try several different email service before I found one which wasn't blocked at his end. But my new email service then blocked all emails sent from his ISP!

Chris