Methods to ensure reliable and dependable e-mail delivery

E-mail management becoming a nightmare?

What you can do about it.

This is a short but essential checklist to ensure successful delivery and receipt.

1] Reverse DNS must be configured on a hosting level. You ISP will take care of this for you.

You can easily check if your RDNS entries are configured.

Reverse DNS (rDNS) is a method of resolving an IP address into a domain name, just as the domain name system (DNS)

resolves domain names into associated IP addresses.

2] SPF -

The Sender Policy Framework (SPF) is an email-authentication technique which is used to prevent spammers from sending messages on behalf of your domain. With SPF an organisation can publish authorized mail servers.

Together with the DMARC related information, this gives the receiver (or receiving systems) information on how trustworthy the origin of an email is. SPF is, just like DMARC, a email authentication technique that uses DNS (Domain Name Service). This gives you, as an email sender, the ability to specify which email servers are permitted to send email on behalf of your domain.

 

If your control panel does not automatically generate an SPF string for you, you can create one yourself. If you have control of your DNS by means of a control panel, you will be able  to add the appropriate TXT entry in your DNS configuration.

The SPF record will make sure that sender is legitimate and is sending from the authorised server, preventing spoofing.

3] DKIM -

DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) is an email authentication method designed to detect forged sender addresses in emails (email spoofing), a technique often used in phishing and email spam.

DKIM allows the receiver to check that an email, claiming to have come from a specific domain, was authorized by the owner of that domain.

[a] It achieves this by adding a digital signature, linked to a domain name, to each outgoing email message. The recipient's system is able to verify this by looking up the sender's public key which is published in the domains DNS entries. A valid signature also guarantees that some parts of the email (attachments) have not been modified since the signature was affixed.

[b] Usually, DKIM signatures are not visible to end-users, and are affixed or verified by the infrastructure rather than the message's authors and recipients.

Some control panels will generate a DKIM key for you. If this is not available we recommend that you generate one yourself. This can be done easily if you have SSH access or suitable tool that will generate the record for you.

4] SMTP

In order to deliver mail securely over the internet, SMTP authorisation is required. A suitable SSL / TLS encryption method is required for mail to be considered secure. If your SMTP server and your SMTP client are properly configured your mail will not end up in Spam.

5] DMARC - a DMARC record can be generated using a suitable tool and the resulting TXT record will be added to the appropriate DNS records for the domain.

A DMARC record is the record where the DMARC rulesets are defined. This record informs the ISPs (like Gmail, Microsoft,

Yahoo! etc.) whether a domain is set up to use DMARC. The DMARC record contains the policy should be placed in your DNS. If your e-mail is going to Gmail or Yahoo Spam Box, you should ensue that DMARC is configured for your domain.

In closing it is necessary to say that much of the agony experienced is due to the fact that automatic updates are not configured for your desktop or laptop. Clearly, if technology is evolving constantly, it is crucial to update your  operating system and e-mail client, such as Mozilla Thunderbird or Outlook. Old e-mail clients that have not been updated will cause delivery failure rendering your system vulnerable. If you cannot afford an Outlook subscription try the free Thunderbird e-mail client by Mozilla. Works perfectly and has a number of plugins to enhance your workday.

If this is way too technical for you to handle, Host Direct's support team will test and rectify for you.

Want uninterrupted e-mail delivery, contact our team.

Tel: 011 421 4434 

Mobile: 067 699 8988 (WhatsApp)

  • #email delivery, #DKIM, #SPF, #Reverse DNS, #DMARC
  • 0 Users Found This Useful
Was this answer helpful?

Related Articles

E-Mail account setup in Outlook

Settings for your Outlook and Mozilla Thunderbird e-mail account:These settings work with the...