On Tue, 14 Sep 2004, Dean Anderson wrote:
On Mon, 13 Sep 2004, Peter Bowyer wrote:
If they have whitelisted MSN, it will be because they want to receive
mail which is verifiably from MSN. It's not a choice I would make
myself, but their network - their rules. SPF has helped them with the
verification.
I also forgot to point out the MSN didn't send email, MSN __users__ sent
email. We already know they are MSN users from the IP addresses in the
Received headers. We still don't know which user it was. Only MSN knows
that, and even then, they don't know if it was due to virus/worm/cracking
until they investigate.
SPF didn't "verify" anything. SPF just helped AOL paint a target on MSN
for spammers and virus writers. Not that I feel sorry for MSN, if they
were dumb enough to go along with that. And of course, the "trust" would
probably be mutual, so MSN paints a similar target on AOL for spammers and
viruses. Mutual self anihilation, I guess. Maybe self-immolation.
Sorry to respond to my own message, but there is one more thing that our
proverbial big providers get from this: They get to mutually deny
unbundled email services. That is, they get to force their customers to
purchase connectivity services from them. There is much more profit
margin in the connectivity than in the email anyway. Email is usually
free or low dollars. That just causes customers to spend more money with
them by abandoning paid-for services that now don't have to be provided.
So what if SPF also brings in more spammers and viruses? Preventing
unbundling could be good for the bottom line for some providers.
--Dean