the recent spam attack

Simon · Jul 03, 2008, 00:22:01

Quote from: Sebby on Jul 02, 2008, 23:59:31
Really? That's impressive! All of our Pipex addresses were complete and utter spam magnets, despite us being very careful.

Funnily enough, the only spam I used to get from Pipex was to the PC Pals account, when it was hosted with WebFusion, then I used to get bucket loads. Since we moved to IDNet, it's practically vanished altogether.

Rik · Jul 03, 2008, 00:25:09

Quote from: Killhippie on Jul 03, 2008, 00:20:35
Cheers Rik, right now I just hope they get this all working again so can see if I got any of the mail I was expecting, as many are i'm sure

I just don't like to have all my eggs in one basket, Gary...

Gary · Jul 03, 2008, 00:27:13

Quote from: Rik on Jul 03, 2008, 00:25:09
I just don't like to have all my eggs in one basket, Gary...

I agree I have google and yahoo, hotmail and o2 etc but its just frustrating to see all the webspace etc was still on one server along with email, in my book thats a big mistake, the email should be better protected and after trevors last crash I had hoped they would have thought about this,any way night all im feeling lousy and its off to bed for me

psp83 · Jul 03, 2008, 00:30:30

Quote from: Ann on Jul 03, 2008, 00:00:45
Tiscali's email was down every week

Did it ever work

Dopamine · Jul 03, 2008, 00:32:12

Quote from: Sebby on Jul 02, 2008, 23:54:24
I agree, Simon, but then Pipex had no spam filtering whatsoever...

I'm a Pipex refugee, and I too stand in defence of their email. Spam can be pretty easily managed by the end user and I'd much rather know that I get everything sent to me than always wonder, as I do with IDNet, how much legitimate email is blocked or delayed by over zealous (and, it would appear, not very reliable) ISP spam management.

All the suggestions that we should invest in private domains with their own email accounts (which I do) are misguided: IDNet advertise their Home Max package as featuring "Unlimited POP3 mail-boxes (@idnet.com)". If it's advertised as part of a service it should be as robust as the internet connection itself, with appropriate investment.

Rik · Jul 03, 2008, 00:33:59

Quote from: Dopamine on Jul 03, 2008, 00:32:12
All the suggestions that we should invest in private domains with their own email accounts (which I do) are misguided: IDNet advertise their Home Max package as featuring "Unlimited POP3 mail-boxes (@idnet.com)". If it's advertised as part of a service it should be as robust as the internet connection itself, with appropriate investment.

I couldn't agree more, we've had too many email failures in the past year. My advice has merely been that of the pragmatist - if it matters, have a backup.

Pez · Jul 03, 2008, 00:57:29

Damn Rik, you're a machine! Do you ever sleep?

Conspiracy Theory - Rik is an auto-bot with automated responses that agree with everything!

Rik · Jul 03, 2008, 01:00:56

I came back specially tonight, Pez, both to check what was happening and because Simon had promised to update me - unfortunately I haven't heard from him.

cs · Jul 03, 2008, 04:13:51

This is really poor, all I need the damn mail server for is authenticated smtp whilst I am on the road

They should provide a seperate smtp server, there is no need for this to be down because of some silly spam filtering service dumped on the server. I think a good many of us would rather they got rid of that all together, or at least made it opt-in and on a different service platform, so those that do not need it are not affected by the problems.

They obviously don't have proper backup/DR in place, mail services are essential and there are plenty of easy ways to get them into a high availability environment. (I am current working on an IT project where downtime is charged to my company at £64k/hour

)

Sorry rant over... I guess i'm just dissapointed, i've had nothing but excellent service from IDnet since I joined a few months ago so I am shocked the email isn't up to the standard of the rest of the service

Malc · Jul 03, 2008, 06:08:47

My pipex email still works, both in and out, 9 months after I left them.

This is not a good situation now, after the price we pay, this should really not be happening $:-\$ I too am waiting for a email, with a few hours left before 24 hours are up, I just hope they get it sorted soon.

Up untill now I have been completly happy with IDnet, but this knocks the confidence a bit to know the protection on our emails insn't that great.

chrisga · Jul 03, 2008, 06:43:04

Quote from: Malc on Jul 03, 2008, 06:08:47
My pipex email still works, both in and out, 9 months after I left them.

This is not a good situation now, after the price we pay, this should really not be happening $:-\$ I too am waiting for a email, with a few hours left before 24 hours are up, I just hope they get it sorted soon.

Up untill now I have been completely happy with IDnet, but this knocks the confidence a bit to know the protection on our emails isn't that great.

Yep I'd echo that - Sorry as a newbie, a whine is my first post on this forum !

I would agree with what has been written about alternative email accounts, and I have one. However, that doesn't help mails that are stuck / maybe lost - The latter, if it proves to be the case, is a cardinal sin for an ISPs, and something that should ring alarm bells about the competence of IDnet, even for those that don't use their mail service. !

Also, why has this gone on for so long ?? - The only reason I moved from a cheaper ISP to IDnet was their brilliant past service levels. I have to be honest, this has knocked my confidence

Steve · Jul 03, 2008, 07:29:39

I think the smtp server is functioning as I am able to send mail.

Malc · Jul 03, 2008, 07:35:53

Same here, sending reports no errors.

Arathorn · Jul 03, 2008, 07:56:02

No luck sending here. I get the following error message:

"An error occurred sending mail. The mail server sent an incorrect greeting. Remote server connection error"

I'm now getting a trickle of mails through via email forwarding but there's a load of emails sitting in Trevor's queue that i can't get at.

Looks like it's going to be a long day!

Arathorn

JB · Jul 03, 2008, 09:21:02

Firstly, please don't think that I am knocking IDNet, because I am not. I think they are a brilliant ISP.

Unfortunately, since I joined about six months ago there have been two occasions where the email system has been 'attacked'. I rely on my email probably no more or no less than other members so I have no gripe. More a need to understand what has gone wrong and why?

My wife regularly corresponds by email with an old English girl friend living in the USA. For quite a time during the last few months, email sent by my wife has been bounced by her friends ISP (Verizon) stating that IDNet is on their blacklist as being the gateway by which spam emails have entered the Internet. This has resulted in my wife having to use a Gmail account to communicate with her friend. Just recently the Verizon ban had been lifted and my wife was able to resume normal email from IDNet. I hope yesterdays problems don't mean that this ban will be reinstated again.

This may seem a simplistic view but if IDNet's outgoing mail server only accepts email from true IDNet accounts and only passes incoming email to bona fide IDNet customers, I wonder how the problem is occurring. Was the spam targeted at just IDNet customers or was a web site co-hosted on 'Trevor' hacked and made to feed copious amounts of spam directly into the server.

Anyway, as I said this is not a dig at IDNet but I would like to know (in due course) exactly what has caused IDNet all these headaches, with which I do sympathise sincerely.

I do have my own domains and therefore my incoming email has been largely unaffected, however it is the loss of the outgoing smtp server which is causing me the biggest headache.

I do hope IDNet manage to recover everybody's email and are able to take steps to prevent this sort of thing from occurring again.

PS. Sorry if the guys at IDNet didn't get much sleep last night

JB.

Gary · Jul 03, 2008, 09:35:59

Well lets hope all goes well today, while i understand issues occur, as echoed in other posts email needs to be on dedicated servers with a backup facility, and not on one hosting webspace etc, we have had to many email issues in the last year. I wish the guys good luck but can see kissing any email sent to my and my wifes idnet account goodbye as 24 hours get closer

Rik · Jul 03, 2008, 09:47:06

Quote from: 6jb on Jul 03, 2008, 09:21:02
This may seem a simplistic view but if IDNet's outgoing mail server only accepts email from true IDNet accounts and only passes incoming email to bona fide IDNet customers, I wonder how the problem is occurring. Was the spam targeted at just IDNet customers or was a web site co-hosted on 'Trevor' hacked and made to feed copious amounts of spam directly into the server.

TBH, JB, I can't give you a good answer as I don't have the information.

There are two mail servers, Pat, which seems very robust, and Trevor, which has been rather more fragile. I'm sure IDNet will be holding an inquest once they restore service, and I have made sure that they have seen all relevant comments from the forum.

You can, of course, send your idnet.com mail using your domain's SMTP server, but getting replies would still be problematic.

JB · Jul 03, 2008, 12:20:42

Quote from: Rik on Jul 03, 2008, 09:47:06
You can, of course, send your idnet.com mail using your domain's SMTP server, but getting replies would still be problematic.

Hi Rik,

Yes I can, but when sending attachments it is much faster via the IDNet server because I am already on 'their network', so to speak.

I just wonder if there was a certain venerability that spammers have exploited. In the two years that I was with Newnet I don't recall such a problem with the mail system.

Having said that, IDNet is 10 times the ISP that my previous one was, in many ways.

Cheers,

JB.

Rik · Jul 03, 2008, 12:22:25

ATM, I don't have any answers, JB. I'm sure IDNet will be holding an inquest as soon as they have the service restored.

Den · Jul 03, 2008, 12:31:15

I most likely require my emails more than most as the central monitoring station I use send me emails to let me know what activations my monitored alarms have sent in the last few hours and as such help me to respond correctly. But things can go wrong with electronics so have pity on Idnet they are doing their best and at least admit when the have a problem.

Rik · Jul 03, 2008, 14:52:23

The problem is, Den, that this has happened several times in the past year. Things do go wrong, but when the server failed, they had us back up and running in a few hours, it's now been 26 hours, and we have no idea when service will be restored or if there will be data loss.

Malc · Jul 03, 2008, 15:01:32

First time, and hopefully the only time, but I have to say this is poor service. Surely with premium prices it should be a premium service. (Which, for me, until now, it was) Why is there no backup server?

I hope they learn from this mess.

We praise them all the time, and rightly so, but it is only fair to say this now

Rik · Jul 03, 2008, 15:10:48

Unfortunately, Malc, a backup server in email is hard to implement as files are, literally, changing by the second.

Malc · Jul 03, 2008, 15:15:33

So how does the .net work?

I assume that hasn't been attacked, and can .com not use the same system.

Simon · Jul 03, 2008, 15:16:46

The problem at the moment, as I understand it, is that Trevor is still on the file system check, and nothing can proceed until this has completed, and there is no indication as to how far it's got, so if they stop it, they risk stopping it at 99%, in which case it would have to start all over again. Rock and hard place spring to mind.