Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Hi,

I have been a long time user of NTL cable. This is my first post to this forum. In the past few months I have been hearing from an increasing number of my friends that their emails to my ntlworld.com account are bouncing back. Two of the ISPs involved are Hotmail and Wanadoo.

Is the email being blocked because of actions by Hotmail and Wanadoo or NTL - the problems seem to have coincided with the introduction of the new SPAM filter on NTL (however I have this configured to off now and emails are still not getting through) and perhaps this is just a coincidence.

I saw in an earlier thread that someone suggested Wanadoo was blocking email to ntlworld - is there anywhere I could find a list of which ISPs won't talk to each other?!

Thanks,

Chris

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I've never heard of any major mail service blocking another, other than by accident.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

There are essentially two lots of spam filtering, one which you can control, the second you can't. It seems email from Wanadoo France is being blocked by the filter you can't control because they have been entered on a spam black list for allowing spam email to be sent and not addressing the abuse reports.

You can see Wanadoo France's listing at SenderBase

Ben

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Conversely I've had the problem whereby my NTL email has been blocked as the NTL mailserver been on at least one blacklist.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I don't use ntl's email service anyway, but my email provider does virus checking and spam blocking.

What you always want to do if you're on a service that does block spam (if they allow it, which most of them seem to) is to go into your account settings (may be somewhere specific, may be part of your web mail), look for the spam settings, and select to have spam marked as such but delivered.

That way you can instantly see what your provider has considered to be spam, but you still receive it - so you still get any messages that might have been blocked, but that you actually want. Any spam filter (even a simple email rule that most email clients will do) will have no trouble sorting spam like this.

I would suggest you have your spam filter/rule move everything marked as spam to a specific folder, where you can examine it at your leisure. Oh, yes, and don't forget to disable any automatic response your email client might make to html, activeX, java etc before you do.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Indeed, this has happened several times this year and is grouped into blocks of IP addresses, so not all ntl email customers are affected at one time.

In fact something was going off on Friday just gone. I sent an email which I expected a pretty much immidiate email to, to two people (one on Clara.net one on a major company's network) and I was speaking to them on Saturday - neither got the message. That could have been something different of course.

That's good advice, but many times this year, not only does my sent ntlworld email end up in peoples spam folders, but many companies now use blacklisting, whereby my email will never make it as far as the recipient's network, let alone their inbox.

It's a poor state of affairs, but to be fair it hasn't happened for a couple of months now - but email from ntlworld does still regularly end up in my contacts spam folders.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Email from wanadoo.fr, and also hotmail.co.uk last I checked, are being blocked because those mail servers are on the sorbs blacklist.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Thanks for all the replies. Simbr's answer seems the most likely explanation - the mail servers my friends are sending from have been blocked by ntlworld because of their poor attitude to dealing with spam. It would be nice if Ntl had an area on their website where users can check which servers are currently blocked (looking at the Sorb site this seems to change from one week to the next)

Whilst I appreciate efforts to prevent spam it is frustrating that so many genuine emails are being blocked - at the moment it is reaching the level that I may have to change ISP although there seems no way of knowing whether any other service provider would be more efficient.

Thanks again,

Chris

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Chris, there's always GMail. Then it doesn't matter which ISP you use (this being the reason that, back in the days I was constantly swapping 'free' (0845) ISPs I eventually signed up for a paid email service (which I later dropped because it was shoddy)).

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

NTL seems to be blocking some emails from plus.com. A friend tells me that I and another of her NTL contacts are not getting mail sent by her because she keeps getting it bounced back after three attempts to deliver it. It makes me wonder what else I am missing!

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

NTL block all email which contains in the header any IP address registered in the SORBS database. This issue has been discussed extensively in other threads, one started by me, but this appears now to have been archived. Basically they just discard "offending" emails without returning any acknowledgement, so it appears to the sender as if NTL could not be located. This has reduced email communications within the committee of which my wife is secretary to a shambles!

I have it from the horse's mouth that NTL have no intention of changing this policy as it is "in the best interest of users". They say it's up to the sender to raise this issue with their ISP. Unfortunately this is at best a blunt instrument, as it could be an intervening relay that is blacklisted, not the sending ISP, and in some cases whether the sender gets through to NTL seems to depend on which part of the country the NTL recipient lives in.

It's nothing to do with the spam filter. However it's worth diisabling this to see how many false positives it would have raised. It seems to get particularly upset about financial emails, even when these are genuine and from reputable sources. Unfortunately it also reveals a steady and disturbing increase in junk email apparently sent bcc to multiple NTL addresses. The latest one I received (bcc) was a "registration confirmation". There is a somewhat heated discussion on this (started by me) here:

http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/sh...ad.php?t=38081

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

A couple of the plus.net servers are on SORBS, first came to my attention a few days ago.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

what email service/providers do people recommend to use then, to ensure their emails reach its destination both ways?

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I have found that NTL was blocking emails from Virgin and hotmail. I also found NTL was blocking emails from a yahoo mailing list for about a week. Finally today a email was not bounced by NTL, so hopefully this is now been sorted.
Bit of worry as I look back at the record of bounces. There are regular times over the pass few months when this has been happening. So I wonder if this means I have missed other emails too.
So I have created a new email account on my new I-Web web site. I know you get free web email accounts, and I have I-Web for my web site but at 99p a month (plus around £18 for a domain name) including Spam Protection, I wonder if this is a cheap solution to NTL bouncing email.

See http://www.i-websolutions.co.uk for further details.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

yes, I agree, although I tend to use a combination of NTL mail, Gmail & email provided by my hosting account (also I-Web).

You can, in fact, get domain names even cheaper, so for someone who 'needs' their email, the facilities provided by a decent host are definitely a viable alternative to NTL.

:notopic: I had a look at your website, btw, George, it looks really good :tu:

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I often get e-mails bounced back by NTL for NTL users when I send them from my NTL account.

So they are blocking their own e-mails.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

That should only happen if the address you are sending to does not exist.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Have had similar problems, with yahoogroups.

Went to the yahoo groups site, and could see that my ntlworld.com address was bouncing so sent a re-activation message.

Nothing happened for a couple of daysb and tried again. In the end I changed the email setting within Yahoo groups to not to convert to html, and the reactivation worked finally.

However still not seeing messages that i post to the groups or messages that other ntlworld.com emails have sent but other non ntl people are seeing them - as i get to see there replies.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I've also been having problems with yahoogroups for some time. About a month ago I finally received a bounce notification and responded. They then started coming again for a while - but have ceased again.

I'll try your suggestion and see if it works.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Email has almost completely dried up- only one in last few days from gov.uk. Anyone know why?

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Emails from Freeserve are being blocked. Ntl tell me that Wanadoo (freeserve) are the ones to deal with this. Wanadoo say that NTL employ the blocking firm so they should sort it out.
Surely two adults could sort the problem out without us suffering? I am also told that the NTL engineers are working on this problem. Does anybody know what is going on please?

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

No it didn't work. I can't work out exactly which server is in the SORBS database, but I have informed Yahoogroups of this issue, and await their response (if NTL allow me to receive it :mad: ). If I do get a response I'll post it here.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Had this with both wannadoo.fr and tiscali.it services. The SMTP retunr from one of them says that the e-mail is full, ie: ntl:s e-mail servers are full !

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Surprisingly I got an immediate response. I say surprisingly because it actually reached me. Unfortunately the response was clearly computer generated, and makes no attempt to address the issues I raised, being just a standard response to any questions about bounced emails. I won't waste time posting the details. I've tried again, but I get the feeling that contacting "groups feedback" is a complete waste of time.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Still no hotmail or tiscali mails from family arriving. Maybe others but no means of knowing what.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

This has been going on for months now. Emails sent from my work account to any NTL account seem to have about a 30% chance of getting through. The usual error given is:

The following recipient(s) could not be reached:
my.name@ntlworld.com on 14/01/2006 17:46
Could not deliver the message in the time limit specified. Please retry or contact your administrator.
< mybigcompany.com #4.4.7 SMTP; >

(Obviously I've changed my email address, and the name of my company's SMTP email server)

The company I work for is a multinational telecomms company. I am sure we are not in SORBS or any other "spam" database. Our business depends on email communications.

Work colleagues have exactly the same problem with NTL accounts.

If you resend the email enough times it will get through. But since each "failed delivery" takes 24 hours this is really not a practical solution.


How do we effectively complain about this?

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

i too am suffering this problem aswell
wtf is this happening anyways .. i can handle my own spam mails lol
i dont need to be babied by some company as to what emails i get and not get, as i've not had one off my lists for a month now grrrr who knows how many other ligitimate mails i have lost ?

ntl should turn this host blocking off + tutorials should be given to new customers as to how to block spam

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

First i do agree with you. However it is not long ago that there was user's on this very forum complaining bitterly that NTL were doing nothing to stop Spam . How times have changed :erm:.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I had a problem logging into my online banking account yesterday after they had been doing major work at the weekend on the bank's systems. I went through the online procedure recommended to reset the account details. This involved being given part of a special password on their site with the other half being emailed to me within two hours. No such email arrived within 24 hours so I phoned the bank. They checked and told me that they had the email logged as being sent an hour after my request. Checked with webmail to see if it was sitting in the spam folder but it wasn't. Appears to have vanished into thin air.

One thing that I did notice though when checking various things was that I do not appear to be going through a proxy now, usually on a Nottingham one by default.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

It is amazing. 5 or 6 days ago I went to town after receiving from NTL broadband support the usual nothing to do with us - up to Wanadoo (or words to that effect) and then they said it was a known problem and my complaint had been escalated. The engineers were working on it, should be sorted in 24 hours. After 24 hours was told that was wrong, takes up to 72 hours. To cut a long story short I rang after 72 hours and they said give it another day or two. So I said will give you until Monday. This AM my freeserve correspondent sent a test that came through, as did a receipt for my reply. Two more were sent to me but had not arrived at lunchtime.At 9pm I tried again and what did I receive, one from Saturday, one from Sunday an d two from today. They must have cleared the problem - I HOPE Will see what happens.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I just discovered emails from yahoogroups had been bouncing since late november. (So that's why I had less crap to read, haha.) Have now logged into yahoo and am not receiving messages again through a non-ntl email address. I even had to sign up again to one group who must have thrown me off because of all the bounces.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

A double post since it wonlt let me edit my post.

I've just had to leave all my yahoogroups and rejoin using a non-ntl email address. Changing the email address to receive emails in settings wasn't sufficient - I received emails but any replies I made (send using my ntl addy) never appeared on the lists.

I'd rather receive a dozen spams a day than have one important one get pilfered away by an overzealous spamfilter. NTL need to sort this out and fast.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Dan- have you logged onto ntl webmail and ensured that your spam filter settings are configured to let mail through? http://webmail.ntlworld.com/

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I must record the latest update on emails from Freeserve to my NTL address. For a whole week now they have been getting through. Will this go on? I hope so. It shows what a little persistence will do even with NTL. Have I spoken too soon?:dunce:

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Thanks, I'll try it.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

ntl are working on the problem. Wanadoo mail should now be OK, since they only have three mail servers to worry about. Hotmail and Yahoo have a lot of servers and they are also hard to communicate with so it will take more time.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I wonder how many other providers NTL does block. All my mails from 'talktalk' account to ntlworld.com have been blocked for the last few weeks.

Its a bit of a shambles - I made several enquiries over a week: NTL first ignored me, then said they weren't doing this, then said that I would have to get recipients to contact them to get the service unblocked - what all twenty or so on my mail list ?

Email interchange is currently unregulated - so any provider can shut down whatever connections they like. At first I thought that a large provider could abuse its market position by making life difficult for smaller providers. But NTL seems to be blocking so many connections that it will only damage itself by offering poor service to its users.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

You have been sent the standard reply by NTL. Try being persistent and insist on speaking to a supervisor - try late evening. Best of all find the server returning the mail and quote the number to NTL.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I always have issues with MSN / Hotmail email - it never arrives! - I've even tested it from my own account....just checked (since I forwarded some emails from hotmail to ntl yesterday) - found two delayed delivery reports...grrrrrr

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I have just found this forum, for about a month my wife has been complaining that she hasn't been receiving e-mails from some of her brothers and sisters, these are e-mails they all send each other - (she's one of 7!). Anyway, I have now realised that all the missing e-mails are from hotmail accounts, the onese sent by family members using other e-mail systems are getting through. A search on the internet for answers last night led me to this forum. So here's the question. This thread is full of people confirmin that they too have had this problem, and full of peoples stories of the inadequacy of NTLs response in fixing it. Surely a forum such as this should have some sort of clout whereby representation can be made by the moderators of thus forum, that they are representing a large number of users. Forum members each individually complaining is getting nowhere.

An alternative suggestion is to start a letter writing campaign to BBC Watchdog.

One more person (me) calling NTL today after reading all the above messages isn't going to make any difference.

What do you all think.

Guy (new member of the forum)

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Not sure if this is the same sort of thing, but I can't send out emails to anyone except other ntl addresses. Keep getting Error 550: Code: 0x800ccc79. Have contacted ntl three times. The first time I was told it was my config that was at fault, but found not to be so. The second time I was told I had been blacklisted. Again not so as I can send to these people through the ntl webmail. The third time I was told it is a known issue and there is nothing I can do about it. The thing is when are ntl going to do something about it. I would like to send emails to my friends, or at least reply to them without having to go onto the web.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

How could any ISP justify blocking an entire server - especially from an ISP? This is bonkers.

Surely spam filtering could only work if the end user is in control. All it needs is a button within webmail that says "this is spam".

If my Hotmail account does block any mail then it goes into the "Junk Mail" folder.

I don't personally use any filtering on my Hotmail account, as I'd rather get spam than miss important mails. Unfortunately the NTL email account doesn't give me - a mere mortal user - the option to do this, as aunty NTL knows what's best. They really are clueless.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I suggest that first of all YOU ascertain from the senders that the emails are being returned to them and ask them to quote the IP number and error number. Then check with the blocking firms. Some of them are:-
SpamCop blacklist: http://spamcop.net/bl.shtml
MAPS blacklist: http://www.mail-abuse.com/cgi-bin/lookup
Distributed Server Boycott List blacklist: http://dsbl.org - probably the most likely
Spamhaus blacklist: http://www.spamhaus.org/lookup.lasso)
When you have done that you will be able to tell NTL AND Hotmail the blocking server and expect them to take some action. DO NOT TAKE NO FOR AN ANSWER

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I have checked at the senders end (on hotmail) what is happening. I visited my brother in law to see how he sends e-mails to my wife. He logged on to his hotmail account, and then sent her an e-mail from a "group" he had set up. We sent 4 test e-mails. One using the "group", one by manually typing her e-mail address, etc etc. We then logged out of Hotmail, and still on his PC I logged in to my spare Yahoo mail account, and sent her an e-mail from there. the ONLY one she got was the one sent via my Yahoo account, all four from her brothers Hotmail account were blocked. The faliure return notice from hotmail takes a day to arrive back at my brother in laws.

I hate Hotmail, so I think I will suggest that my wife opens a Yahoo mailbox account and uses that, its a far simpler and less cluttered interface.

Why oh Why is NTL blocking Hotmail users e-mails, and why have they not sent out a circular telling their customers that they will not be receiving e-mails that are sent to them from hotmail users. My wife has missed out on about 10 very important e-mails.

Guy

---------- Post added at 11:11 ---------- Previous post was at 11:07 ----------

When I checked those links they ask for an IP address of the server that I want to check... how do I find the IP address of the hotmail server that has been blocked by NTL.

Guy

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

The server IP address should be in the rejection message in a form similar to 81.103.221.10

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Although I seem to be getting mail to NTL addresses from my wanadoo address at long last,( I assume so, as none have been returned to me for a couple of weeks now), it would appear that not all receipts for mail are getting back to me from at least one of my NTL contacts. So it would appear thay there may still be a problem somewhere in the system.

I believe NTL were rather slated on "Watchdog" a while ago - perhaps a few more letters to them, or "Which" , would bring to the public view the problems that NTL subscribers, and those who deal with them, have encountered over the last few months.

AS Guygamps rightly points out, many people may have been totally unaware of this problem and will have possibly missed important emails. The only reason I knew mail wasn`t getting through was because 2 of the people I e-mail on a regular basis are with NTL.
I`m not saying wanadoo are brilliant, but a definite :td: for NTL based on recent events!

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I seem the recall that receipts from outlook don't work on ntl, iirc the receipts are sent with a sender of <> which the mail server rejects.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

FINALLY !, I seem to be receiving E-mail from Wanadoo again.
Whoever sorted this problem out a big :tu: to you.
Let's hope this issue is sorted.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

A year ago I congratulated myself that NTL had been persuaded to sort out the problem of emails from the French Freeserve (Wanadoo) server and last week, foolishly, deleted the emails involved. It looks now as though I must go through the whole question again. Emails from Wanadoo are again being blocked to NTL. I hesitate to send messages again to NTL because the answer will come back ' it is a problem for Wanadoo to sort out, not ours' Wanadoo will say 'it is NTL doing the blocking so they must sort it out' Does either of these firms feel any responsibility towards customers?
Perhaps we should revert to pigeon post!
Does anybody have any ideas on what to do - perhaps knocking of heads together would be of benefit - if we could find the heads.:dunce:

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

NTL seem to be adopting a most dishonoarable practice of blocking e-mails from other ISP's in a rotational basis, presumably to get them a bad name and to get their customers to change to NTL! I've had various friends affected by this over the past 6 months and going into even the NTL forum gives no answer when I insert the error messages my friends hhave been receiving. A recent example is "Error 421". Maybe the answer is to move from NTL!!

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I hesitate to subscribe to the idea that the blocking is deliberate, it is more likely to be a matter of incompetence but even that is a little strong, possibly it could be ascribed to something in the nature of children squabbling. It looks as though I will have to start my badgering again, last time it seemed to get results. First of all it was not a matter for NTL, then a problem was acknowledged, then the engineers were working on it, then it was cleared(3 weeks I think). Since then the amount of spam has increased again so NTL will be blaming Wanadoo but after all it is the blocking firm paid by NTL that will have put the mockers on so why cannot NTL tell them to take the block off? Oh me, oh my these things are sent to try us and they do!! :mad:

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Whilst it's a nice conspiracy theory, the truth is much more prosaic - if no less frustrating. NTL ignore all email which has originated from, or passed through, a host registered on either of two databases of hosts known to relay "spam". One is SORBS. ISPs can get their hosts removed from the SORBS database, but they will reappear if more spam appears.

Recently Yahoo! has been intermittently blacklisted, which is a pain for many of us who are registered with Yahoo! forums - and in at least one case a forum moderator!

But why should NTL "Play god"? I still get masses of spam (80% of which is intercepted by NTL). So there are two issues. First, that there is no way that NTL can prevent spam (any more than anybody else can). Second, they have filters in place which can trap most of it in any case. So why ruin the email service for thousands of people, by reducing it to little more than a lottery? What if somebody sends me something urgent, and NTL decide that because it "could be spam", they will just ignore it? And now many other such emails have NTL thrown away which I am unaware of? :banghead:

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

They don't use SORBS anymore, they use Spamcop and continue to use Spamhaus.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I wonder if we are being a little harsh on NTL. This morning the floodgate seemed to open with emails coming through from Wanadoo. I saw that there were some planned outages last weekend-could this have been the reason? It should be noted that these outages did not seem to cover the regions I was concerned with. I believe that the problem started early last week so far as the south of England was concerned . Incompetence? or lack of concern for users?
Will we ever be able to find a reliable way of sending messages?
I made a mistake in an earlier posting when I said that I had been involved with the same problem a year ago - it was earlier this year - time flies. :confused:

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

What happens when NTL ignores an email is that the sender will assume that the NTL mail host is down, and will retry - usually at intervals of a day - until either it finally gets through, or the sender finally gives up. If during this time, the sender (or possibly an intermediate relay, which probably explains the geographical effect) gets removed from the blacklist, it's likely that several emails originally sent several days ago will finally be accepted, so you will see a "cluster" of them. However older ones which have already timed out are lost for good. Look at the sent timestamp of the emails. I bet that some were first sent days ago. It happens to me regularly with emails from Yahoo! Groups.

In the case of Yahoo! Groups, it keeps track of the number of "bounced" emails, and after a while flags you as having a "bouncing email address". It then stops sending any emails at all until you reply to an "unbounce" email - which of course you may also never receive!

As for SORBS, I stand corrected :o: but the same principle applies. While NTL persists with this policy, its email service is fundamentally flawed - perhaps even unfit for purpose - as you will silently lose an unknown number of emails. However I've banged on about this before, so I'll leave it at that. :(

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

agreed. i had this row with them some time ago and now figure the only way the message will get through is if i finally bite the bullet and ditch ntl. if i do, they'll lose the telly and phones, denying them of monthly revenue from me of circa £150-£180 per month. given broadband is looking less and less of a bargain with each day that passes its looking highly likely.

so if any ntl honchos are watching on, have a think. i suspect i am not the only one fed up with intermittent loss of a trustworthy email service.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Is it, then, that the recipients of my emails from wanadoo/orange are to blame for not replying to my emails (the ones that get through, that is!) on a regular basis???

I am getting mail returned again after 3 days or so - I have no way of knowing if they`ve reached their intended destination until I have a reply- or a return.

I`ve been able to get mail through by sending messages via ebay, bluemountain cards, etc - and the odd stray one has found its way through - but it really is a ridiculous situation in this day and age when technology is supposed to be so advanced! Perhaps we should go back to phone calls and snail mail!!

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

You are seeing the same symptoms, which suggests that either NTL itself is blacklisted, or a relay the email message passes through is blacklisted. Whilst it's likely that a relay is to blame (so traffic in both directions through it will be affected), it would be ironic indeed if the people blacklisting email hosts were themselves on the blacklist! I've had emails from beeb.com dumped because a Demon relay the messages passed through was on the blacklist. The Beeb's fault of course. :Yikes:

The reason that some occasionally get through is probably to do with the route the message takes - i.e. occasionally it isn't routed via the blacklisted relay. But as you say, it does make a complete mockery of the email system. The ten or so spam emails NTL traps and puts in my spam folder every day get through unscathed, whilst genuine emails are thrown away "because a computer somewhere on the route it took has been forwarding spam". So as well as wrecking the email system, it doesn't even stop spam. And how do you define spam in the first place? I've had perfectly genuine emails from people in my address book dumped in the spam folder by NTL before now. :shocked:

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

No win for NTL, really, not to defend them, but trying to be realistic, previously people complained when any mail was let through, whether it was spam, full of nasties, whatever. Now they try to filter it & people still complain.

One thing is for sure, people consider their email to be much more important than NTL do. As far as NTL are concerned it is just part of the overall service, and, as such, has no guarantee or SLA.

I'd be interested to hear if any other ISP has a SLA for email on domestic accounts, as I'm of the impression that they are all pretty much the same??

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I'm not complaining about the filtering. They provide a spam folder and you can log in via webmail and decide which if any you want keeping. This Spamhaus thing isn't filtering. It's blanket rejection of emails from certain sources regardless of content. There's a big difference!

Worth adding that I have never once had a spam email from Yahoo!, so they are shooting at the wrong target anyway. The email protocols are so insecure, and there are so many compromised PCs out there spewing out spam with forged headers, that it's difficult if not impossible to figure out where the spam originated from. The only way to ensure that no spam is received is to block everything from everywhere. Either that or introduce decent email protocols with proper authentication.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Oh I don't disagree, but as I said, NTL don't consider email as any more than part of their overall service. Handling excessive spam messages costs them money, so they take steps to reduce it.

I can only suggest for anyone who relies on email, for any reason, that they don't use a 'bundled' service supplied by an ISP, but go for a hosted domain.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

This is my last contribution for now. Had I realised when I signed up for NTL email that it was going to be such a hit and miss affair, I might well have gone down the hosted domain route. But we have four email addresses, and literally hundreds of people in our address books, and perhaps as many more who have our email address for some reason, including banks, forums, online stores, newsletters... My wife is secretary of a choir with over a hundred members for starters.

DO NTL publicly state anywhere that their email service is inherently unreliable, and that there is no guarantee that people will receive emails sent to them? Do they publicly state that they reserve the right to reject incoming emails from any source without notifying the intended recipient? Somehow I suspect not, otherwise people would ditch the service in droves. Most probably just blame the failure to receive an email somebody swears they sent them on some glitch in the system.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

and of course ntls strategy has been to get people to sign up for triple play, with quadruple play to come, precisely because they know such bundling makes it easier to retain customers. so if thats their game every element of the service should be reliable. i dont expect the post office to pick and choose on my behalf what it will deliver even if my doorstep does get clogged up with junk - including persistent and insistent ntl mailers telling me how great they are.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I think many people regard their home email address as dependable tbh. I don't get any spam at my ntl address because I don't use it to subscribe to anything that may attract any; I have a bundle of hotmail and gmail accounts for that.

Reason I've found my way to this thread at this time is that I have a friend with an old fsworld email address. Just this week we made arrangements to meet. Her confirmatory email arrived today, 3 days after being sent, and a day after we had sorted out our miscommunication with a successful exchange of emails. There used to be a problem with her emails simply being returned undelivered after a couple of days, but that seemed to be a thing of the past. I guess it isn't.

I've never come across any indication from Ntl that their email service is unreliable, that's certainly not how they sell it. Do other ISPs have similar problems with their email service?

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I do sympathise, and realise that changing email addresses is a big hassle.

Unfortunately you can pretty much assume that unless an ISP states they have any guarantee or SLA on a domestic email service, that they don't provide one...

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

What I don`t understand is why my emails to ntl don`t get through and yet I`m an "approved sender" to my contacts.

ntl is not just filtering out spam to its users, but sometimes vital communications. I can certainly identify with bean999`s friend, as that is the situation I`ve been in - arrangements made by emails which have never arrived .
6 months or so ago we thought this problem had been resolved once and for all, but here it is again!
AS far as I`m aware, I`ve never had a problem with emails getting through to me at wanadoo/orange - they`re not perfect, but at least I get my mail!

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I am also having problems with mail to my ntl account.
In my case it is the spamcop blocklist which is listing two IP's at Manchester University. Ntl wont own up to using the SCBL but when the block delists in comes my missing mail.
So yes Ntl you are using it !! and in the process causing havoc with legitimate mail.
I would like to speak to someone just once at Ntl that has a clue what I am trying to get over to them, and get them to read the recomendations on the spamcop site in relation to the use of the SCBL

Anyone from NTL reading this,
quote from spamcop,
Implement the SCBL to Filter Spam
The SCBL aims to stop most spam while not blocking wanted email. This is a difficult task. It is not possible for any blocking tool to avoid blocking wanted mail entirely. Given the power of the SCBL, SpamCop encourages use of the SCBL in concert with an actively maintained whitelist of wanted email senders. SpamCop encourages SCBL users to tag and divert email, rather than block it outright. Most SCBL users consider the amount of unwanted email successfully filtered to make the risks and additional efforts worthwhile.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

this has gone beyond a joke. im losing stuff let right and centre.

ntl. wake up. you are going to lose a lot of custom

---------- Post added at 12:37 ---------- Previous post was at 12:22 ----------

hey, guess what, tech support denying they use sbcl

---------- Post added at 13:00 ---------- Previous post was at 12:37 ----------

now they dont deny it.

but they say i need to contact people whose emails are failing to reach me, get the error message, then phone ntl back @ 10p a minute so they can escalate.

NO NTL. YOU TAKE OWNERSHIP OF THE PROBLEM. YOU RESOLVE I YOU THICK GITS.

looks like i might be ditching all my ntl services if this carries on. thats the downside of triple play ntl. hope youre listening.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

This is exactly what my father was told 6 months ago - as well as being told that it was my provider at fault!! It was ntl all along.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

you surprise me. customer services are now looking into it but breath is not being held as previous experience has not been good.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

All sounds very familiar!

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

indeed. to be fair the customer services woman was really good. spoke to several people in tech support, realised she was getting nowhere, called me back, apologised and bunged some free call plans my way. sadly theyre not much use when what im after is a reliable email service.

but heres a question. why cant tech support understand that if i cant receive emails from a sender on my ntl account but can on hotmail THEN ITS AN NTL PROBLEM! ;-)

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I think the reply to that question may be unprintable!!! :) :)

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Yes, I spoke to Tech services over a week ago on this, they were passing my query on this to a higher level of support.
Just passing Jupiter now I may however not get a reply in my lifetime.

My mail is from a mailing list and comes through the servers at Manchester University. The problem there is that not only this mailing list, but all other traffic comes through it too.
So how the !**! do they expect anyone to pin it down.

So it's again 19 hrs to the next spamcop delist.
I have now opened a gmail account which does let this mail through.

The only difference is that it is now coming to me on ntl via Googlemail & not directly from the university server. But at the end of the day its still entering Ntl, but bypassing the SCBL.

Do they want us to shop elsewhere ??

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

They are still at it. 1 message gets through from a Wanadoo address, receipt is returned and received. Then a full stop. Are we being rationed to one message a day from wanadoo. This happened yesterday and today. I have emailed tech support in the hope that I may get a reply some time. An automated reply has just arrived but it looks as though they do not expect to reply properly. What can we do?

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I know one of the Wanadoo servers was on the spamcop blocklist the other day, check your senders IP at http://www.spamcop.net/bl.shtml
If it's listed you know the cause and can bring it up with them.

Someone posted a freephone number on one of the forums,
0800 183 0213 press 3 when prompted and it takes you to the normal line.
Not tried it yet, but next time...much better than paying for the call !!

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

wonder if we could coordinate a response to ntl on this? unless theres collective anger theyre just going to keep on keeping on

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

We have just been informed that an urgent email from Manchester University was bounced. The sender had to use a different email address to get through to us.

As for Spamhaus, this article might interest people:

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/0,39020330,39283356,00.htm

---------- Post added at 17:59 ---------- Previous post was at 17:53 ----------

NTL aren't "filtering". If the sending host is on the Spamhaus (or whatever) database, they refuse to respond to the incoming message. They don't get as far as actually looking at it. The sending host returns an "NTL server could not be contacted" error to the originator, will retry for a few days, then gives up. In some cases it can be days before the originator realises that something is amiss.

---------- Post added at 18:04 ---------- Previous post was at 17:59 ----------


Nice one NTL. How do you know whose emails failed to reach you? But I can tell them the message - not that they don't know already. "The NTL mail server was unreachable for xxx days."

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I've just been sent the response the Manchester University man got from his local server (suitably edited); oddly he can now get through, so it must have been removed from the spam database:

To quote the SMTP standard document:

So the server isn't just ignoring the messages; it's pretending that it has a problem and must shut down. Sneaky.

I'm told that Chester University has also been blocking email from Manchester University.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Quote....A message that you sent has not yet been delivered to one or more of its
recipients after more than 48 hours on the queue on serenity.mcc.ac.uk.

Yes It is Serenity that is my problem too It is on and off the blocklist every day, current listing,
Query bl.spamcop.net - 130.88.200.93
(Help) (Trace IP) (Senderbase lookup)

130.88.200.93 listed in bl.spamcop.net (127.0.0.2)
If there are no reports of ongoing objectionable email from this system it will be delisted automatically in approximately 17 hours.

Listing History
In the past 93.0 days, it has been listed 43 times for a total of 23.8 days

Great isnt it !!

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Right, checked senderbase.

If the person ( or is it you, I lost the thread ) trying to contact your from within that University changes their outbound SMT server to either:

130.88.203.23 yearning.mcc.ac.uk

or

130.88.203.16 xenial.mcc.ac.uk

Then they may be able to get email to ntlworld, as neither of these servers are currently listed in bl.spamcop.net. Assuming of course that these servers can be explicitly used as smtp servers in the email client settings.

You have to remember that there is a specific reason why the servers are listed in spamcop....they are being used to send spam.

Of course, ntl does not have to use such lists, but having been on the receiving end of ntl's lack of proper mail filtering, and having to delete between 30 - 50 junk emails per day, I for one are glad they are doing this.

---------- Post added at 19:01 ---------- Previous post was at 18:53 ----------

Why bother? The servers are listed because of spam reports, and a listing happens when there are mutliple reports. sure, ntl COULD decide not to use those lists, then we would see the complaints creep up about the spam problem on the ntl network.

At its peak, up to 30M emails were being blocked daily from hitting the ntl network from known spam allowing networks thanks to these block lists.

I know its frustrating, but there is a collective responsibility here. Where ntl have been listed, they have worked with the listing organization to identify the rogue client or clients and take action to prevent listing again. When they demonstrate this they get de-listed. The same should be for those currently on the block lists, work with the listing network, sort out the problem, get removed from the list.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Somehow I don't think it is that easy, Changing the server would be one major task.
I receive mail (or not) from a mailing list which is one small part of the overall University system. If it was a small organisation perhaps....

The mail block is not due to spam, but mis directed bounces, and with so much traffic through the server it could come from anywhere within the mail system. The administrator of the mail list will not be able to source the problem as its outside his immediate area.

You are right someone needs to look at it from within the University, but where they need to look is the question.
Meanwhile no spam = no mail

---------- Post added at 20:10 ---------- Previous post was at 19:39 ----------

OK. lets try a different approach.
I have just sent an email to, postmaster@mcc.ac.uk pointing out the University servers Serenity & Probity being on the spamcop blocklist and playing havoc with mail to Ntl users.
I have also asked if they are aware of this and is anything being done to solve the problem.....

Let's see.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Possibly. But the point is: how many of these "up to 30M" emails were spam, and how many were genuine - possibly important - emails? And if this spam blocking is so wonderful, why do I still get on average ten spam emails per day?

Spam will not be conquered by using blunt and inappropriate instruments; it will only be blocked by implementing secure, authenticated, email protocols, so that the sender of the spam can be positively identified and prevented from sending any more spam. That is if you can determine what is spam and what is not. I've earlier commented on the increasingly sophisticated methods spammers are using to defeat spam filters. Although why they bother is another question. Some of the contrived spam emails I receive (despite NTL's precautions) are so obviously bogus that nobody in their right mind would respond to them. But sadly, some people are that gullible I guess.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

indeed. i get a ton of day trader stuff all the time. but have missed som important mails. id rathger have my own anti-spam software and decide what i want to receive as ntl obviously cant be trusted to operate a succesful whitelist (or indeed stop tech support lying or being ignorant of their sbcl subscription)

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

For the last 2 days emails have been getting through from Freeserve after I had contacted NTL and the Freeserve client had been in touch with Orange/Wanadoo/Freeserve BUT the latest reply seems to be a load of nonsense and contradictory:-
"It does seem that alot of people are having the same problem unfortunately it isnt ntl who are stopping the emails coming through its wanadoo, orange and freeserve who have blocked their customers contacting ntl.
Below is a statement that was sent to us to advise all customers with this problem, i hope this will explain the problem alittle easier for you.


"This has been caused by the Yahoo Groups and Wanadoo / Freeserve mail servers being blacklist by serveral blacklisting companies including those used by ntl to manage the anti-abuse mail platform.

We are working with the client to open communications with Wanadoo, freeserve and Yahoo to try and alleviate this problem.

Please advise customers that this is a third party issue which cannot be directly resolved by NTL. NTL are aware of the issue and will help the other mail providers as much as possible to resolve it. "

So now you know, make of it what you will. :Yikes:
The main feature is that something has or is being done

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

tbh, i am in no way surprised the manchester uni's mail servers are on a spam list. it's not just for ntl users, i emailed a place about some accommodation only for the mail to bounce due to the spam listing. it'd be interesting to see what they (manchester uni) say about it

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Apparently they started queuing mail last week and trying again later as a way to alleviate the problem.
I am told the email manager returned from holiday on monday last, and I dont see either of the two university servers listed in spamcop now and its been that way all week......lets hope it stays that way.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I don't dissagree with you on this, however as there is no universal approach to a "secure authenticated protocal" system for email, perhaps with the exception of SPF then ntl is doing the best it can from a two pronged approach. Server side blocking from networks with a hightened increase in spam allowance, and a a pretty good scanning system called Brightmail.

There are spam emails getting through yes, but a search on these forums will show how bad ntl's network was before they implemented these systems.

False positives are a way of life, and no network that operates some sort of spam filtering is free from such problems.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Why is it so difficult to find out from ntl exactly what e-mails they do block?
I sent this simple enquiry using the contact us form on the ntl site.

"Are any e-mails which are sent to ntlworld.com email addresses discarded
before being passed on to the user. If so what rules and or blacklists are
used."

The first response I got was a pointless list of questions (See the end of this post for what they sent.)
Some answers were already given in the info required to be able to send the contact us form and most of the rest totally irrelevant.

I replied with answers to their 9 questions, several days later I still do not have the answer to my single simple enquiry because all I received was the following reply. From this i suppose I can conclude no-one at ntl gives a damn about a potential customers queries about their service, they are ignorant of their own service, they do not (cannot?) read what is sent to them .
======
Thank you for your email.

Due to the security procedures we have in place at NTL, in compliance
with the Data Protection Act, we cannot accept any change of information
regarding customer?s personal or account details or divulge account
information via e-mail.

If you contact Customer Services on 0845 454 0000 or 150 from your NTL
line free of charge and they will be able to assist with your enquiry.

Please note that we cannot action any callbacks through this Inbox.

Regards

NTL Customer Concern
=========






List of silly questions from ntl - presumably requiring silly answers:-


Dear Customer.
Thank you for your email.

Unfortunately, I do not have enough information from your e-mail to
diagnose the problems you have been experiencing or to locate your
account.

Can you please contact us again with a few more details about the
problem.

If you could please provide the answers to the following questions, I
will then be in a better position to help you:

Q1. What is your full ntlfreedom e-mail address? (e.g.
your.name@ntlworld.com)

Q2. What operating system are you using?
WINDOWS 98/ME/XP/MacOS 8-9/MAC OSX?
Please note that these are the only operating systems that we can offer any technical support for.

Q3. Full description of the problem.

Q4. What is your type of modem

Q5. What error messages or error numbers did you get, if any? (i.e. ERROR 691)

Q6. Do any of the other functions/programs on your computer operate normally?

Q7. What program are you using when the problem occurs?

Q8.If your problem is with our connection software (Rydial)?
RyDial keeps a log file of all dialler activity in the following pathway... C:\Program Files\ntldial\Rydial.log (this will launch in Notepad) please cut and paste the information it contains into your reply to us as it
will show us any failed connections and help us to diagnose your problem
Please do not attach the file as our server will strip it out for security reasons.

Q9. When did it last work normally?

If you could contact us as soon as possible, with the answers to the above questions, and any other information that may help us, we will do our best to resolve this problem for you.

Alternatively you may wish to call our technical support helpline, all our helpline numbers are listed in the footer of this e-mail.


Regards Ntl Freedom Support Team
www.ntlfreedom.com

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Two reasons.

First, they use 2 block lists, Spamhaus and Spamcop. If a network email server appears in any one of those lists, and is NOT white listed (allowed even though it may be listed), then all connections from that email server are blocked until the server is removed from the list and ntl's servers updated.

Second, they use Brightmail content filtering, this usually does not block legitimate email, so it is unlikely that it is this system that is blocking mail you are expecting.

Therefore it is not possible to say with any accuracy what emails are being blocked, but if you know the SMTP server of the sender, and check the IP address of that server against the links below, you may get a vlue.

Spamcop here
Spamhaus here

Hope that helps.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Thanks Toto. That does help a little and having found this forum I was beginning to pick up that much.

So ntl could say the emails will be discarded if they come from a server with an IP address on X or Y blocklists.

What I was getting at is why couldn't ntl make it easy to find out that they use block lists and tell us which ones so that we can check for ourselves if mail is likely to be missing. Up to now I only have the info on this forum to say this is what happens.
Can I accept your answer as the definitive and up to date list of blocklists used by ntl? and which of the various lists at Spamhaus, say, is it ntl uses ? Are you privy to ntl policy and practice on this issue ? With what authority ?

Spamhause own site says:
"We ask, but do not require, that all ISPs using the SBL and/or XBL inform customers of the fact you run spam filters (simply because it is the correct thing to do). Use of known-to-be-effective spam blocklists is normally seen as a service advantage and strong sales point. All SBL and XBL Users are welcome to use the email protected by SBL and XBL web badges on sites"

By giving the option of having some SPAM marked and directed to a particular mail folder and saying nothing of emails being rejected ntl gives the impression that no emails are being discarded even before that stage.

If emails coming from IPs on the spamhaus/spamcop lists are discarded outright before the end user gets the chance to see it, then which SPAM is marked and put under the end user control if that option is chosen ?


I must admit that although I can see arguments both ways the risk of losing good emails (and not even knowing about it) seems to outway the benefits of this method of fighting unwanted email and I want to know what the risk is before signing up for a package which includes email.

Any comment on the crass response from ntl to my enquiry ?
You, presumably not employed by ntl and paid to help their potential customers, have done more than their staff to give me info about their system. Quite honestly that response is enough to put me off them without even getting the info about their email handling.

I need to check out this Brightmail thing as well.

---------- Post added at 10:10 ---------- Previous post was at 10:01 ----------

I understand that you were trying to be helpful - but ...

How would I know the SMTP server of the sender of an email I don't even know I haven't received because it has been completely silently discarded with no info to the sender or intended recipient?

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

---------- Post added at 12:16 ---------- Previous post was at 12:11 ----------

Seem to have made a mess of this reply. However , the last time I looked spamhaus and spamcop showed no block but uceprotect.net showed a level3 block on 81.103.221.10. Messages are now coming through but it looks as though this is another agent being used by NTL

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Hmm.....that will hit ntl email users sending through ntl servers when the recipeint server uses that block list.

---------- Post added at 13:58 ---------- Previous post was at 13:50 ----------


OK, kind of left something out of my response.....sorry :(

Any network that is prevented from sending email at the first stage, block list check, their server receives an error message telling them that their server is on a block list, including a URL to reference their blocked status. That mail server admin team can then resolve the issue with the block list host.

So whilst the intended recipient of the email will not know that a mail sent to them has failed due to blocking, the sender of that email, or their network operator should.

Worth keeping in mind also is that the lists are dynamic, and many blocked networks become unblocked after a period of time, even if the network has not taken sufficient action in time to resolve the issue.

I think that ntl technical support chaps send out an email to a customer who has contacted them regarding a blocked email issue, the answer they give is probably better than mine as they will have better knowledge of the process.

Hope that helps.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Toto
====
That is something - even if ordinary email users do not know how many emails are going undelivered our technical guardians do - but do they do anything about it?

I have yet to see any evidence that ntl technical support have any knowledge of the process (based on response or lack of to my enquiry)

I don't know about these lists being dynamic especially reading this bit on SORBS website
=================================

Please note that entries in the SORBS DUHL never expire, not even the entries we inherited from Easynet NL Dynablock. We always require contact from the network owner for modifications.
=================================

This relates to (for example)
Netblock: 82.1.32.0/19 (82.1.32.0-82.1.63.255)
Record Created: Thu Sep 16 13:37:21 2004 GMT
Record Updated: Thu Sep 16 13:37:21 2004 GMT
Additional Information: Dynamic/Generic IP/rDNS address, use your ISPs mail server or get rDNS set to indicate static assignment.
Currently active and flagged to be published in DNS

These are IPs allocated by ntl to their users on the SORBS list since 2004 if I am reading this correctly. (I know this is the other side of the coin - potential blocking of mail going out from ntl users but it makes the point.)

---------- Post added at 20:50 ---------- Previous post was at 20:42 ----------

jackclare
=======

You certainly did mess up that last message. In fact you "put words in my mouth" by inserting text in the middle of my quoted message - any chance that you could do the decent thing and edit it please?

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Ahh, ok, what you are refering to there is a list of IP addresses that are dynamically assigned, that list is a little different.

In a nut shell all IP's in that list should not be running their own mail server other than the mail server matching the MX record of the domain in question.

Those lists are built in conjunction with the ISP's to help networks to make decisions about whehter to accept emails from dynamic IP addresses that are running their own mail servers, something that is generally accepted should not be happening.

What does his mean in practice therefore for a dynamic ntl IP address?

If the source IP address is using a known ntl SMTP server, such as smtp.ntlworld.com, then the email will be passed for delivery, however, if it is not an ntl mail server, then the recipient server will reject the email if it uses the SORBS DUHL. I think that's a pretty basic explanation, if anybody more techy wants to chip in, please do. :)

The Block Lists are dynamic, and an explanation of the spamcop listing policy can be found here

Really hope that helps a little more.

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

Apologies, not much good at finding my way round. Will try harder

Re: Emails being blocked by NTL
 

I haven`t found out that mail hasn`t been delivered until 3 days after it`s been sent, which is a bit late to try to make contact any other way if the email is important/urgent!