Spamassassin marks mails from the KSP forum

[tommez0x00]

This post is addressed to any forum admin. I don't know who is the right address, so I just start a thread. Maybe other spamassassin users want to ACK.

That's what spamassassin on my mailserver doesn't like in the automated forum notifier mails ([email protected]):

-0.0 SPF_HELO_PASS          SPF: HELO-Name entspricht dem SPF-Datensatz
 1.2 RCVD_HELO_IP_MISMATCH  HELO-Name und IP-Adresse in Kopfzeilen passen
                            nicht
 0.9 RCVD_NUMERIC_HELO      "Received"-Kopfzeilen enthalten numerische
                            HELO-Identifikation
 2.0 FSL_HELO_BARE_IP_2     FSL_HELO_BARE_IP_2

That's a total of 4 points where only 3 already are needed for spam marking.

Maybe other spamassassin users have the same results and maybe the forum admins are interested in and able to change anything that helps to avoid their mails going directly to spam folders.

And no, I won't just increase the required spam marker points.

[Vanamonde]

Moved to Kerbal Network, the sub-forum in which to talk about the whole forum.

[sjwt]

Add KSP to the white list, it should have one.

[tommez0x00]

Add KSP to the white list, it should have one.

My intention to tell you this spamassassin thing is that I think there may be some other users with the same problem. Either they all need to whitelist KSP forum or KSP forum needs to edit something in its config or whatever. I don't know if that's even possible.

Just wanted to let you know that there may be users who don't get the forum mails and don't know why because they don't look in their spam folder regularly.

[KasperVld]

My intention to tell you this spamassassin thing is that I think there may be some other users with the same problem. Either they all need to whitelist KSP forum or KSP forum needs to edit something in its config or whatever. I don't know if that's even possible.

Just wanted to let you know that there may be users who don't get the forum mails and don't know why because they don't look in their spam folder regularly.

I've looked on the SpamAssassin website and it seems the problem is not with them because they don't maintain a list of blocked websites. You need to talk to whoever runs the server with your email (so, your ISP or your system administrator at work)

[Tiberion]

I think you're misunderstanding what he is saying. SpamAssassin filters emails based on rules, so if the incoming email breaks enough "rules" it gets flagged - these rules pertain to where they are coming from, how the message is constructed, how the headers resolve back to the origin and so on.

Those 4 "lines" in the OP are 4 "infractions" that the filter detected - it only needs to break 3 to get flagged.

My German is extremely limited, but it seems they are:

1. The HELO name (server identity) doesn't match the one listed in the SPF records - it might also be saying they do match and its not breaking the rules.

2. The HELOs IP address and the IP address in the header do not match

3. The "Received from" header section contains numerical addresses (IP addresses instead of resolving domain names)

4. An IP address is bare or "in the open" within the headers

Now, server admins can configure Spam assassin, changing how many "points" are required before a message is flagged as spam, so this may be a case of this particular server being very strict. And I don't know enough to say either way. It might be worth passing on to whoever maintains the settings on the forum server (which is the one sending the forum mails, I assume) to make sure its sending messages properly. It may have different settings than any actual mail software in use on the server (I know Vbulletin used to use PHPMail and had some extensive email setup configs, but that was many many versions ago)

[sjwt]

I think you're misunderstanding what he is saying. SpamAssassin filters emails based on rules, so if the incoming email breaks enough "rules" it gets flagged - these rules pertain to where they are coming from, how the message is constructed, how the headers resolve back to the origin and so on.

SpamAssassin still uses white lists, and that is the easiest solution..

https://wiki.apache.org/spamassassin/ManualWhitelist

[Tiberion]

It's not a global whitelist, if spamassassin is flagging KSPForum emails, it would on others with similar settings as well.

IE: its a report of a possible problem, not a request for a workaround.

[tommez0x00]

Tiberion exactly got the point!

For me that's no problem. I check my spam folder regularly. But others probably don't.

Maybe that's exactly the problem of some users in this thread for example: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/87108-Subscription-to-thread-isn-t-notifying-by-email-of-new-posts