valid EHLO/HELO command

['chris']

hi

We are sending mails over the smarthost -> mail.domain.com and have delivery problems to some mail server worldwide.
We cannot contact some admins from the big mail providers like gmx.com
why our mail are rejected.
Even smarthost admins will not really help.

We suspect, it could be HELO command problem:

(HELO s238579rg12.dc01.domain.net)

and not sure if is it correct.

Here is a Header from our mail server over smarthost to gmail.com, but this mail was delivered succesfully:

Delivered-To: mymail@gmail.com
Received: by 10.204.53.6 with SMTP id k6cs19871bkg;
Thu, 10 Dec 2009 06:42:34 -0800 (PST)
Received: by 10.229.29.204 with SMTP id r12mr2246806qcc.72.1260456153007;
Thu, 10 Dec 2009 06:42:33 -0800 (PST)
Return-Path:
Received: from mail.domain.com (mail.domain.com [215.X.X.X])
by mx.google.com with SMTP id 7si1201038qyk.12.2009.12.10.06.42.32;
Thu, 10 Dec 2009 06:42:32 -0800 (PST)
Received-SPF: neutral (google.com: 215.X.X.X is neither permitted nor denied by best guess record for domain of user@mydomain.net) client-ip=215.X.X.X;
Authentication-Results: mx.google.com; spf=neutral (google.com: 215.X.X.X is neither permitted nor denied by best guess record for domain of user@mydomain.net) smtp.mail=user@mydomain.net
X-VirusChecked: Checked
X-Env-Sender: user@mydomain.net
X-Msg-Ref: server-2.tower.domain.com!1260456149!20633325!1
X-StarScan-Version: 6.2.4; banners=.,-,-
X-Originating-IP: [213.X.X.X]
Received: (qmail 7032 invoked from network); 10 Dec 2009 14:42:30 -0000
Received: from s238579rg12-p.domain.net (HELO s238579rg12.dc01.domain.net) (213.X.X.X)
by server-2.tower.domain.com with SMTP; 10 Dec 2009 14:42:30 -0000
Received: from s258579rgew60.bluee.net ([10.83.115.119]) by s238579rg12.dc01.domain.net with Microsoft SMTPSVC(6.0.3790.3959);
Thu, 10 Dec 2009 14:42:29 +0000
Subject: =?iso-8859-1?Q?Invoice?=
Sender: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?firm?="
From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?firm?="
Date: Thu, 10 Dec 2009 14:42:29 GMT
To: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?mymail@gmail=2Ecom?="
Reply-To: user@mydomain.net
X-Priority: 3
MIME-Version: 1.0
X-Mailer: JMail 4.5 by Dimac
Content-Type: multipart/mixed;
boundary="--NEXT_BM_4CCC946C22551B00A058F081B478C0B3"
Return-Path: user@mydomain.net
Message-ID:
X-OriginalArrivalTime: 10 Dec 2009 14:42:29.0260 (UTC) FILETIME=[FF8F64C0:01CA79A6]

This is a multipart message in MIME format.
----NEXT_BM_4CCC946C22551B00A058F081B478C0B3
Content-Type: text/plain;
charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: Quoted-Printable

[Ivan Ferreira · Accepted solution]

If you don't have access to the smart host is a little more complicated.

Here you have a sample of how to test a mail exchange using SMTP commands directly, there you can see a message when and why the other domain is rejecting your mails:

http://exchange.mvps.org/smtp_frames.htm

Sometimes, mails are rejected if a reverse DNS lookup cannot be performed, of the sender domain is not registered on the public DNS space.

['chris']

The gmx mail server is rejecting our mails, here is the problem:

2009-12-08 11:23:04.682468500 starting delivery 35454: msg 722441 to remote user@gmx.ch
2009-12-08 11:23:04.893973500 delivery 35454: deferral: Connected_to_213.165.64.102_but_greeting_failed.
/Remote_host_said:_421-4.3.2_{mx018}_Too_many_bad_recipients._
Are_you_an_address_harvester?_Try_again_in_24_hour(s)_46_minute(s)_/421_4.3.2_and_see(_http://portal.gmx.net/serverrules_)/


What means greeting_failed or address_harvester?

[Andrew C Fieldsend]

"Greeting failed" means that the target mail server has marked your sender's address as suspect, because it has sent too many emails with "bad addresses".

An address harvester is a program which sends out emails to random addresses in the hope of finding valid addresses, which can then be used as targets for spam emails. Most modern mail services will mark any sender which sends too many emails to invalid addresses as a potential address harvester, and force a delay (24 hours in your case) before accepting any more emails from that sender.

If you don't send to large numbers of incorrect addresses (possibly out of date ones?), then you may be running an open relay - check your mail server configurations to be certain that you aren't.

['chris']

THX