 JAXxaka StephenPremium
join:2000-03-31
New York, NY
 ·VOIPo
| Goodbye Earthlink This may be unrelated but a couple of weeks ago some people sending me email to my earthlink hosted domain based email was bouncing back with an error message suggesting that the sender was emailing from a relay or zombied computer with instructions to send an email to blockedbyearthlink@abuse.earthlink.net with no additional instructions. If you send this email you get no instructions back, nothing happens. My first chat with off shore tech support (web hosting used to have US tech support but no more) said he would fix the problem (he couldn't and he didn't) and he also sent me the instructions that people should follow if they couldn't email me (see below). How am i supposed to send these instructions to people if I don't know who isn't reaching me? The big Catch-22 that they failed to appreciate. Perhaps Joseph Heller isn't read in India.
Another inane and circular conversation went on between me and a supervisor for almost 3 hours with them basically claiming that a) they couldn't help me directly and b) people who have trouble reaching me should email blockedbyearthlink@abuse.earthlink.net after which they will get an auto-response with instructions (they don't).
Finally I asked the supervisor, who claimed there was no higher tier of support to "stand up and wave your arms at the person down the hall who is your boss and ask them to come over" which she actually did. Perhaps 3 hours on the phone with me was enough. The Uber Supervisor after talking to me for 30 minutes or so finally agreed to contact the abuse dept directly in Atlanta but then said "sorry they're closed for the day".
End result: during this 3+ hour phone call to hell, i researched better and cheaper web hosting companies and found one that looked great and that has 24/7 US based tech support for about $4/month instead of ELN's $20/month. Everytime I call them they answer right away, and have been very helpful. I canceled my ELN web hosting account and will never go back to them for anything, ever. There is a reason they're slowly going out of business.
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The long instructions. Can you imagine asking people to actually do this?
Here are some additional info, based on instructions that came from EarthLink Abuse (I highlighted the more important sections):
PLEASE READ THE ENTIRE EMAIL TO RESOLVE YOUR ISSUE
This email address is only for those issues where EarthLink appears to be blocking a mail server and mail is returned with the the following error messages: "550 Dynamic/zombied/spam IPs blocked. Write blockedbyearthlink@abuse.earthlink.net ".
EarthLink may be blocking your mail server because the server is/was listed in a dynamic IP range, an open proxy, a compromised machine, or major source of spam.
In order to help you with your issue we will need some information from you. If you are the administrator of this mail server, please follow the instructions below before emailing us back.
If you do not know what IP address your server is sending with, please contact the mail administrator of your company or your ISP and have them follow the instructions below.
If you are the administrator of the email server being blocked, please know you may be able to expedite unblocking by checking to see if your mail server is listed in the following lists and resolving before emailing us:
The CBL
This is a list of IPs that may be currently infected and sending spam unknowingly.
Spamhaus
From their website you will be able to query your IP to see if it listed in any of their 3 lists that track dynamic IPs, zombied IPs, and IPs that are known to purposely send spam. EarthLink blocks IPs known to be dynamic, zombied, and purposely sending spam.
If your mail server/gateway IP is not on these lists, is not dynamic, and is not an open relay/proxy/zombie, please reply back to blockedbyearthlink@abuse.earthlink.net with 'BLOCKED ' in the subject line with the mail server/gateway IP inserted.
Blockedbyearthlink@abuse.earthlink.net does not block any mail sent to it; so, if possible, please email us from the server in question. All reports sent to this address, not using this format will receive this auto response. This process will allow us minimize the amount of time to resolve any blocking issues. Please note, any emails you send to us without the formatted subject lines are not kept. If you included important information in that first unblock request, please make sure that information is included in your subject-formatted response.
Thank you for your cooperation,
EarthLink Abuse
To recap:
The person/company blocked by EarthLink should check if their server is/was listed in a dynamic IP range, an open proxy, a compromised machine, or major source of spam. They could check if their server’s IP address is listed in the two websites indicated above.
If their IP address is part of a dynamic IP range, is an open relay, or has been known to be a major source of spam, they should resolve that first before contacting EarthLink.
The person/company blocked by EarthLink should follow the prescribed subject line format (‘BLOCKED ’) when sending an email to blockedbyearthlink@abuse.earthlink.net
It is preferable that the email to blockedbyearthlink@abuse.earthlink.net is sent using the actual mail server being blocked, rather than EarthLink Support agents do it in behalf of the caller.
If they already sent an email to blockedbyearthlink@abuse.earthlink.net but did not follow the subject line format, they should re-include information in the prior email to the new email they will be sending. The previous email they sent was not kept by Abuse.
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JAXx, aka Stephen
~ All my opinions are only my opinions and if anyone else shares them - it's chance ~ |
