SpamExperts

• Incoming filtering
• Add accounts to allow list in Spam Experts
• Are viruses blocked too by the spam-filter?
• How does incoming filtering work
• How to exclude a certain email address from being filtered?
• How to setup an incoming spam-filter
• Login to Spamexperts panel directly
• SpamExperts: Which MX records should I use?
• Testing your mailserver when using SpamExperts
• What are domain aliases in SpamExperts?
• What to do when I receive spam?
• Which IP addresses should be whitelisted on a mail server?
• 🇪🇸 ¿Cómo configurar el filtro de entrada de spam?
• About SpamExperts
• Expiration of Spamexperts bundle
• Expiration of Spamexperts single filters
• How to Update the SpamFilter Domain User Contact Email Address
• How to create a Spam-filter report?
• SpamExperts - discontinuation of legacy reports and the new Email Scout Report
• SpamExperts cancellation (bundle and single filters)
• Spamexperts bundle downgrade
• What is email archiving and how to enable it?
• Why a new spamfilter was imported to reseller account by Openprovider?
• FAQ: Troubleshooting
• Full Knowledge base from SpamExperts
• Mail stays in the delivery queue or gets bounced back
• Monitoring / Status check of SpamExperts service
• Unable to create a Spam Filter - Error 11006 pops up
• What happens if email is delayed by the filter?
• What happens if the mail server goes offline?
• Why is there no subject in the logs?
• Outgoing filtering
• How does the outgoing filtering work?
• How to order and setup outgoing spam filter?
• Is it possible to activate the option "valid sender address required"?
• Outgoing mail is quarantined
• Which SPF record to use with a spam filter?
• 🇪🇸 Cómo configurar el filtro de spam de salida
• FAQ: Spam Experts extension for Plesk
• How to configure Spam Experts extension for Plesk in Openprovider?
• What is Spam Experts extension for Plesk & How SE extension for Plesk works?

Incoming filtering

Add accounts to allow list in Spam Experts

Question

How to add accounts to allow list in Spam Experts?

Answer

There are two allow lists - Sender allow list and Recipient allow list.

Note: This article assumes that the user already knows the ways to access their Spam Experts control panel, in case you have doubts or do not know how to see the aforementioned menu, we recommend you visit this article where we detail how to configure your service by Spam Experts.

What is Sender allow list, and how to manage it?

Incoming mail received from senders listed in the Allow list will always be allowed, regardless of the message classification.

Go to Incoming - Protection Settings > Sender allow list

The above window will be displayed, you just need to click on Add sender to allow list option.

In "local-part" add the name of the email to be added and in "address" the domain name.

For example. If you need to add an email called victor@gmail.com, then the configuration would be as follows.

Local-part
Victor

Address
gmail.com

Note: It is important to check the option “Apply to both”

Once this is done, press the "Save" button.

What is Recipient allow list, and how to manage it?

Incoming mail sent to recipients listed in the Recipient Allow list will always be allowed, regardless of the message classification. This is generally not recommended for normal mailboxes.

Go to Incoming - Protection Settings > Recipient Allow list

Note: This page lists read-only rules, which are set by a higher level admin.

Are viruses blocked too by the spam-filter?

Question

Are viruses been blocked by the Spam-filter?

Answer

Viruses, malware and other online threats are often been spread via email. Therefore it is essential that emails are scanned for viruses before they reach users' mailboxes. Spamexperts actively blocks both spam and malicious attachments such as viruses, malware, ransomware, spyware and so on.

The additional anti-virus measures include a sequential combination of different technologies to protect clients against malware. This includes the open-source ClamAV antivirus framework, which is enhanced with additional data-sets specialized in detecting zero-day email viruses provided by several external partners.

For additional explanation of the virus protection by Spamexperts you can visit the follow Link

How does incoming filtering work

Question

What is incoming email filtering and how does it works?

Answer

Email filtering separates legitimate email from unsolicited bulk email with the help of advanced
algorithms and spam pattern detection methods. 

It works by Re-routing the email through filters.

Spamexperts incoming spam filter is a gateway solution.

Activation is done via a simple DNS adjustment. Once the MX-records are changed, all inbound email goes to the Spamexperts system first, where it is filtered and then relayed to the unchanged destination mail servers of your clients. 

Deployment

The actual message filtering is done in the highly redundant Spamexperts Hosted Cloud.

This solution is fully managed, maintained, and 24/7/365 monitored by Spamexperts.

Filtering work flow:

The filtering of e-mails is done on two levels.

• • At the SMTP level, the validity of the sending mail server is checked. The e-mail data stream is collected until the RCPT TO command. This way, the e-mail can be logged, but the usage of resources is minimized.
    • If there is no reason to mark the sender as 'suspected', the e-mail is sent to the next validation step immediately.
    • If the sender is known as a malicious source, the e-mail is blocked immediately; the sender receives a 5xx code with explanation. This is a permanent reject.
    • If there is no reason to entitle the sender as malicious, but the sender is trusted neither, a grey-listing algorithm will temporarily block the e-mail (temporarily rejected).
    • An RFC-compliant mail server will retry; at the first retry after 10 minutes the e-mail will be accepted by the Spamexperts filters, and the e-mail will be forwarded to the next validation step.

• • At the DATA level, the complete e-mail is loaded and verified. Advanced statistical algorithms are used to qualify the e-mail. Because multiple of those algorithms are used, the risk of an incorrect reject (false positive) is almost zero - the logs of Spamexperts show that this only happens in 0,001% of all cases.

E-mail that is blocked on the DATA level is put into the quarantine mailbox and can be released from there. E-mail that is blocked on the SMTP level cannot be recovered: the e-mail was simply not received completely.

How to exclude a certain email address from being filtered?

Question

How to prevent an email from being filtered?

Answer

By configuring allow or block list filtering rules for outgoing or incoming filters the emails in the configuration will be accepted or sent without the need for the filter to check it.

This is very useful when there is an abuse e-mail address that for example should receive all e-mails.
In this case, add abuse@yourcompany.com to the recipient allow list.

The steps for the configuration can be found on the following URLS of Spamexperts knowledge base for Allow list/Block list and the incoming and outgoing filter rules.

Allow list/Block list

Allow list/Block list filtering rules: 

• Add incoming allow list filtering rule
• Add incoming block list filtering rule
• Add outgoing block list filtering rule

How to setup an incoming spam-filter

Question:

How to order and configure an incoming spam filter?

Answer:

In order to set up an incoming filter on domains, first one needs to have a domain.

It does not matter if the domain is with Openprovider or with another registrar.

Step-by-step guide:

1) Log into the Openprovider control panel and navigate to Spam filtering (SpamExperts) > Order new filter.

2) On the next screen:

- Enter the domain name

- Select the desired filter (Incoming filter / Outgoing filter / E-mail archiving)

- Enter the mail-server host address

3) Click Save

Now the incoming filter for the domain has been created but, not yet configured.

4) Add MX records to the DNS zone of the domain.

If the domain is with Openprovider and is also using Openprovider's NS, the following MX records will be automatically added by our system to the DNS zone.

Otherwise, you will have to add them manually.

• mx.spamexperts.com (with priority 100)
• fallbackmx.spamexperts.eu (with priority 200)
• lastmx.spamexperts.net (with priority 300)

Be sure to never add other MX record(s) together with the Spamexperts records: this will result in only partial filtering of the e-mail, and not remove spam completely!

In case a DNS zone isn't created yet for the domain and if you would like to use Openprovider DNS service, please refer to the article. 

In case the DNS zone is with Openprovider, navigate to DNS management > DNS zones overview and click on the domain in the list.

Once the DNS zone details page is opened, click on the Details tab and Enable the SpamExperts checkbox. Once the page is refreshed the MX records will appear automatically added into the zone.

5) To configure the mail server to accept the spam-filter connections and treat them as 'trusted'.

This can be done by whitelisting the domain-name delivery.antispamcloud.com in the mail server.

6) In some cases SpamExperts server also needs to be added to the SPF record of the domain DNS zone.

In order to do this, please add the following SPF record with the content below:

"v=spf1 include:spf.antispamcloud.com -all"

Or add include:spf.antispamcloud.com -all to the existing SPF record.

For more information about the incoming spam filter can be found in the knowledge base of SpamExperts.

Login to Spamexperts panel directly

Question

Is it possible to log in to Spamexperts control panel directly?

Answer

When creating a spam filter with Openprovider the credentials for direct access to the Spamexperts control panel can be found in the Openprovider panel. 

The following links can be used to log in directly to the Spamexperts panel.

Domain Account

Bundle Account

Save the link in the browser so that it can be found without accessing first the Openprovider panel. Be sure to enter the link as HTTPS, otherwise, the security may give an error about cookies not being enabled.

Note: One can create login credentials also on user level, allowing the end customer to log in to the Spamexperts control panel directly.

To create login credentials for a mailbox user, first one need to log into Spamsxperts control panel and scroll down to the bottom of the menu. Search for Users & permissions > Manage email users  on menu item and click on it, (see example below). Then one will be able to add email user for a domain.

Such users will have limited access to Spamexperts control panel allowing them to view their own logs, manage emails moved to quarantine and change some minor settings.

NOTE: Due to security setting from Spamexperts, always use HTTPS to log in. If you try to login to Spamexperts directly via HTTP, you will get a message that the browser doesn't support cookies.

Also, users only have domain level access and it comes with certain restrictions compared to admin level access - which is managed by Openprovider. Some options like editing Email Scout Report (ESR) templates, enabling domain-level reporting etc... won't be available for users.

SpamExperts: Which MX records should I use?

Question:

Which MX records should I use for SpamExperts incoming filtering?

Answer:

To use the SpamExperts incoming spam filtering service, you need to update MX records for your domain in your DNS zone to the following:

Important: You must make sure you remove old MX records so that all emails are filtered through the Spam Experts cloud. Spammers actively try different MX records (such as the highest numbered priority) to bypass spam filters.

The priorities are incremental. Because the mail servers have been set up using the Round Robin method, the load will be distributed evenly about the servers. Differing priorities is one of the algorithms SpamExperts uses to distinguish spam from legal e-mail.

If you still use our solution where you have a bundle of domains instead of separate domains, you will need to use the following MX records;

• primary.mail.registrar.eu (priority 10)
• fallback.mail.registrar.eu (priority 20)

Testing your mailserver when using SpamExperts

Question:

What to do if suddenly the SpamExperts cluster gets stuck.

Answer:

If the SpamExperts cluster gets stuck, there might be a problem with your (customers) mail-server where the mail gets delivered in the end.

You can test this yourself by simulating a mail-delivery to this mailserver.

In a Windows cmd-shell or on a UN*X/Linux/Mac console, type the following commands.
Below is an example, you can use your own data at underlined places:

Command-shell>  telnet mail.mycustomer.be 25 220 MICROSOFT EXCHANGE 0.1 ESMTP Mail Server Ready (You should receive a 220-response) Command-shell>  helo myrandomname 250 HELO 85.159.97.15 , Nice to meet you! (You should receive a 250 response) Command-shell>  mail from: myownmail@weprovideyoumail.be 250 Ok (You should receive a 250 response)

Command-shell>  rcpt to: info@mycustomer.be  <--- Enter a valid mail-address where mail should be received

250 Ok

(You should receive a 250 response)

Command-shell>  data

354 End data with .

(Server gives a 354 message, accepting the mail)

You can quit now, or actually type data to send a mail. End it with a single dot (.) on a line and enter to send it.

If you get other responses or no response at all, there might be a problem with the mailserver.

What are domain aliases in SpamExperts?

Question

What are domain aliases in SpamExperts?

Answer

You can configure an unlimited number of domain aliases for a domain filter. All email traffic sent to these aliases will be filtered. Spam messages will stay quarantined in SpamExperts, and all legitimate email will be delivered to the main domain.

Domain aliases do not have separate access to the Domain Level Control Panel. Since all SMTP traffic to the domain alias is rewritten to the main domain, any changes/lookups on the main domain will simply include the alias domain traffic as if it was sent directly to the main domain. If you are searching for a specific email sent to a domain alias using the Log Search, the recipient will therefore show as user@maindomain.

Note: When adding a domain alias, the MX-records are not updated automatically and have to be set manually to the same MX-records as the main domain.

Example case:

• You configured the filter for example.com, using mail server mail.example.com

• For this domain, you add otherdomain.com as an alias

• An email sent to info@otherdomain.com will be examined by SpamExperts filter and delivered to info@example.com

• The To field in the email header will show the original e-mail address

Aliasses

Domain aliases do not have separate access to the Domain Level Control Panel.

Since all SMTP traffic to the domain alias is rewritten to the main domain, any changes/lookups on the main domain will simply include the alias domain traffic as if it was sent directly to the main domain.

If you are searching for a specific email sent to a domain alias using the Log Search, the recipient will therefore show as user@maindomain.

Note: When adding a domain alias, the MX-records are not updated automatically and have to be set manually to the same MX-records as the main domain.

What to do when I receive spam?

Question:

What can I do when I receive spam?

Answer:

First check whether the e-mail is filtered by SpamExperts. If so, you will find a line in the e-mail headers that starts with X-SpamExperts-Class. Is this line not present? The the spam filter was not used. Possible causes can be:

You configured SpamExperts less than 48 hours ago; the DNS system uses caching mechanisms that store some data locally to prevent overload of the nameservers. This might result in temporarily outdated data.

• Check whether only the SpamExperts MX records have been added in your DNS zone, and no other MX records. Check this by going to the Openprovider reseller control panel, menu DNS management>DNS checks.
• Some spammers remember old mail servers for a long time. That can cause old mail servers to be used long after you changed them to SpamExperts.
• Sometimes spammers just try to be lucky by using an ordinary hostname like mail.yourdomain.com to send spam, so that the official MX records are bypassed.

If X-SpamExperts-Class is included in the headers, but the value is whitelisted, then you or the e-mail user whitelisted the sender. Other values for this field are ham or unsure; in those cases, SpamExperts was not sure enough to categorize the e-mail as spam.

Note that an expired (non-renewed) bundle will automatically whitelist 'all' senders! See for more information our article about expiration of a spam filter bundle.

When a spam message has been delivered despite of the filtering, you can train the spam filter by the button Report spam in the SpamExperts control panel. Here, you can upload the original e-mail in .txt or .eml format. The Microsoft Outlook .msg format cannot be used!

Which IP addresses should be whitelisted on a mail server?

Question

Which IP addresses should I whitelist on my mail servers to accept filtered incoming mail traffic from SpamExperts?

Answer

That depends on solution you use.
1. Public domain cloud
2. Bundled-solution

SpamExperts public cloud (per domain filters)

In order to accept messages from the SpamExperts public cloud (antispamcloud.com) filtering servers, emails coming from "delivery.antispamcloud.com" host should be explicitly allowed on your mail server. This hostname contains all active IP addresses used to send email from SpamExperts public cloud. Alternatively it is possible to allow traffic from any IP address with the PTR record *.antispamcloud.com.

Please make sure your firewall rules do not block port 53.

In case if allowing emails based on hostname is not an option it is possible to configure destination mail server to receive emails on alternative port, such as for instance port 2525 instead of the default 25. If you want to configure non-default port for mail delivery on your destination server it can be configured via destination route for the domain in Openprovider control panel (e.g. like mail.mydomain.com:2525). 

If neither approach above is acceptable SpamExperts public cloud IPs could be explicitly whitelisted. Full list of IPs of SpamExperts public cloud is available via link.

SpamExperts cloud hosted by Openprovider (bundles)

For customers who use SpamExperts bundles in Openprovider the list of IPs is different from the SpamExperts public cloud. 

In order to accept incoming mails from Openprovider SpamExperts hosted environment, the next IP addresses needs to be allowed on the destination mail server.

65.108.53.141

2a01:4f9:c011:a01e::1

37.27.16.104

2a01:4f9:c011:a925::1

65.21.183.151

2a01:4f9:c012:98aa::1

65.109.233.174

2a01:4f9:c012:8abf::1

65.108.241.80 

2a01:4f9:c012:57ad::1

65.108.214.134

2a01:4f9:c011:a2ef::1

95.217.174.147

2a01:4f9:c01d:857::1

34.249.79.17

2a05:d018:c9d:b900:1e69:2691:fe7d:661c

54.195.120.9

2a05:d018:c9d:b900:c397:e98f:a61f:cb87

54.194.42.112

2a05:d018:c9d:b900:c8bd:65ce:f2e5:d378

🇪🇸 ¿Cómo configurar el filtro de entrada de spam?

Configurar el filtro de spam es sencillo. Solo hay que seguir estos pasos:

1. En el panel de control, clicar en "Filtros de Spam / añadir nuevo filtro".

2. En la siguiente pantalla, añade el dominio, selecciona "filtro de entrada" y añade el servidor de correo. Clica en guardar.

3. Añade los siguientes registros mx a tus DNS:

mx.spamexperts.com (prioridad 10)

fallbackmx.spamexperts.eu (prioridad 20)

lastmx.spamexperts.net (prioridad 30)

4) Ahora configure el servidor de correo para que acepte las conexiones del filtro de spam como de confianza. Esto se puede hacer mediante la lista blanca del dominio delivery.antispamcloud.com en el servidor de correo.

También se puede hacer mediante la lista blanca de las direcciones ip del antispam. Puedes encontrarlos aquí:

Http://noc.spamexperts.net/

Por favor asegúrate de suscribirte a la rss feed si utilizas el sitio web para saber cuando un dirección IP se agrega a esta lista.

5) En algunos casos Spamexperts también necesita ser añadido al registro spf del dominio.

Para ello, añada los siguientes registro SPF: 

- "v=spf1 a:683.submission.antispamcloud.com -all"

o

- a:683.submission.antispamcloud.com al spf ya existente

About SpamExperts

Expiration of Spamexperts bundle

Question

What happens with a bundle account when it expires?

Answer

A Spamexperts bundle is automatically renewed on its expiration date unless the account balance is insufficient at that time.

Expiration of a Spamexperts bundle is performed in three steps:

1. Filtering disabled: At the moment of expiration the bundle is not just deleted but whitelisted with a 'wildcard' address for all filters. This means that every e-mail is accepted and the recipient finds spam messages in the mailbox.
2. Mail delivery disabled: If after one week the bundle is still expired, mail delivery is disabled. The mail recipients will not receive any e-mails anymore.
3. Removal of filters: Another week later, the filters are removed from the Spamexperts servers and all settings, logs and quarantined e-mails are lost.

In all stages, an expired bundle can be reactivated. After reactivation, allow a few hours for all settings to be restored. Reactivation during phases [1] and [2] recover all filter settings. Reactivation after removal of the filters (phase [3]) result in recovering of the mail routes (destination hosts) and aliases, but all other settings are lost and cannot be restored.

Expiration of Spamexperts single filters

Question

What happens with a domain single filter when it expires?

Answer

A Spamexperts domain filter will be auto-renewed at its expiration date, as long as your account balance is sufficient. Otherwise, the filter will auto-expire.

If SpamExperts renewal fails due to insufficient balance, the filter is deleted. The filter will be removed from the Spamexperts servers and all settings, logs, and quarantined e-mails are lost. A deleted filter can not be restored and hence you will have to recreate it and reconfigure the settings if you need to re-activate filtering. 

How to Update the SpamFilter Domain User Contact Email Address

Please follow the below process for updating the SpamFilter domain user contact email to allow password reset links to be sent to a new email address.

• Log in to RCP
  Access your RCP (Reseller Control Panel) account using your login credentials.

• Navigate to SpamExperts

  • From the Dashboard, go to SpamExperts.

  • Select Filters Overview.

• Access the SpamExperts Panel

  • Choose the specific filter you want to manage.

  • Click to log in to the SpamExperts panel.

• Open the User Profile

• • In the SpamExperts panel, navigate to the User Profile section.

• Update Email and Password

  • From the user profile page, you can update the email address where password verification links are sent.

  • You may also update the password if required.

Note: You can still access the SpamExperts panel for specific domains via the link in the Control Panel (RCP), even if you’ve lost or forgotten your SpamExperts password.

How to create a Spam-filter report?

Question

How can to create a Spam-filter report?

Answer

A one-time report can be created by the button On-demand report in the Spamexperts control panel. One can create a report for the last day or the last week, other reporting are not available. The report is sent by e-mail to the address indicated.

A weekly automated report can be configured in Manage settings. Those reports can be sent to one or more of the recipients boxes.

For more information about reports visit the follow article of  Spamexperts Knowledgebase.

SpamExperts - discontinuation of legacy reports and the new Email Scout Report

In the coming weeks SpamExperts will discontinue the legacy reports that you can configure and receive from their platform. Therefore, it is highly recommended to start using a brand new feature called Email Scout Report (ESR).

It is one of the best ways to monitor your domain and every message that goes in or out of your mailboxes.

How to configure your new reports is provided in detail in SpamExperts documentation.

Once you have run your incoming or outgoing log search, you can choose to set up an Email Scout Report (ESR). This report contains the results of the log search and can be scheduled to be sent to a specific recipient or to all mailboxes in the domain. An ESR can be set up to run straight away, at a scheduled date and time or periodically, at a scheduled date and time. 

In the domain settings it is also possible to enable automatic email scout reports for selected domains. If this option is enabled, an Email Scout Report is automatically sent to every regular mailbox in the domain at the times specified (up to three times daily). The report lists all quarantined messages of which the filter was least certain and has an option to release any wrongly classified messages. Reports will not be sent if there are no such messages. Users who receive the report can choose to unsubscribe from the reports from within the message.

Like mentioned above, we highly recommend switching to this new report feature. In case you have any questions, please feel free to contact us!

SpamExperts cancellation (bundle and single filters)

Question

How to delete a spamfilter?

Answer

SpamExperts filtering is managed via single filters or via bundled packages.

- Single filters:
To delete a SpamExperts single filter, go to filters overview and click the domain you want to delete. You can click then on "bin icon".
Please note that a filter will be directly deleted at Spamexperts. This action can not be reverted.
A deleted filter can not be restored.

- Bundled packages:
To delete a SpamExperts bundle, remove first all the domains currently active in the bundle. Once the bundle package is empty, send an email to support@openprovider.com requesting the deletion of the bundle package.

A confirmation will be sent once the bundle is deleted.

Important Note:

A SpamExperts bundle package will always be auto-renewed (sufficient balance is required), even if there are no active filters anymore. For this reason it is recommended to send the "bundle deletion" request to support@openprovider.com at least 5 days before the renewal date,  so that support team can delete the bundle account on time.

Spamexperts bundle downgrade

Question

How to downgrade a Spamexperts bundle account?

Answer

Spamexperts do not offer the service of bundles accounts anymore and for this reason it is not possible to modify a bundle account.

Note: In case one want to delete a bundle account and request spam-filters by domains. One can use the information in the following link. Cancel Bundle

What is email archiving and how to enable it?

Question

What is email archiving and how to enable it?

Answer

Email archiving allows to backup and store all the organisation's email and access it easily if needed. By doing so, it helps maintain legal compliance.

Enable Incoming / Outgoing archiving

Mail archiving incoming

Activation for inbound email archiving is outstandingly simple. It requires a simple MX-record change in the DNS of the domain, which one can find by following this link.

All inbound email traffic will then go to Spamexperts system first and then a copy will be then made and stored in one or multiple storage locations. The email is then delivered to the unchanged mail infrastructure of the recipient.

In case the incoming filtering for the domain has already been enabled before, enabling the archiving is just a matter of a single click in RCP.

Mail archiving outgoing

To archive outbound emails via Spamexperts, an administrator needs to redirect the outbound email traffic to Spamexperts system. This can be done by either configuring the mail server to use smtp: 683.smtp.antispamcloud.com on port 587 and using Spamexperts archiving system as a smart host (thus, the entire mail server or only some of the domains will be archived), or by re-configuring the settings (only selected users will be archived).

For this add the below SPF record to your DNS zone:

"v=spf1 a:683.submission.antispamcloud.com -all"

Note: The archiving is purchased per every 10gb. If this limit is reached, the system will upgrade this automatically with 10gb. There is no maximum limit.

Why a new spamfilter was imported to reseller account by Openprovider?

Question

Why are Spamexperts filters automatically added into one’s account and invoiced?

Answer

There are certain scenarios when SpamFilters can be created directly in the SpamExperts panel bypassing the Openprovider system:

• The filter is created manually by the Openprovider administrator directly in the SpamExperts panel by customer’s request.
• The filter is transferred to Openprovider SpamExperts account from another SpamExperts account
• The filter is created by the customer whom Openprovider gave sub-admin permissions in SpamExperts control panel for usage with a 3rd party system (i.e. Plesk)
  

To ensure filters ordered using above methods are accessible via RCP and invoiced, the following procedure is performed:

1. Reseller’s accounts cross-checked daily against Openprovider SpamExperts account to ensure spam filter portfolio consistency
2. If a discrepancy is found, the filter is imported to reseller’ s account and invoiced the same day
3. If the invoice fails due to insufficient balance, the filter is deleted

Our system will send a notification to the reseller in case a filter is added or (due to insufficient balance) deleted.

FAQ: Troubleshooting

Full Knowledge base from SpamExperts

A full knowledge base with information about SpamExperts services is published by SpamExperts itself.

Mail stays in the delivery queue or gets bounced back

Question

What to do if the email get bounced back?

Answer

If the mail-server is configured correctly and has no known issues (like a full disk, cpu overload), but still email does not arrive and is instead waiting in the delivery queue or bounced back to the sender then the cause is usually one of the following;

• The issue is on mail-server: Unfortunately it happens very often that people are not aware of problems happening on their mail-server. Double-check this with your systems manager.
• The mail-server is filtering the emails deliver by the spam-filter: This will make the mail-server blacklists or misjudging the headers that Spamexperts added.

If you use Spamexperts platform, make sure that the final receiving mail-server does not have spam-filtering turned on, to avoid the chance of blocking the spam-cluster itself. If it is really necessary to turn on spam-filtering, even though the emails are been filtered already, please make sure the following IP's are whitelisted in your firewall:

If the server is not filtering the emails coming from the Spamexperts platform, please contact our support team sending a email to support@openprovider.com.

Monitoring / Status check of SpamExperts service

Question

Where can I check if there is an active issue with the SpamExperts service?

Answer

SpamExperts updates about their service can be found via the link below:

https://uptime.n-able.com/

Unable to create a Spam Filter - Error 11006 pops up

Symptoms

When adding a new filter (incoming or outgoing) and filling in the mailserver IP the corresponding field - the filter is not created with a similar error message "('_ERR_SE_DESTINATION_INVALID', 11006); // Your request contains an invalid destination"

Cause

The Spamexperts is not accepting the IP of the mailserver in this field. Same happens when we try to fill in IP in the Spamexperts panel.

Resolution

The mailserver hostname has to be filled in to the mailserver field (for instance, mail.example.com)

What happens if email is delayed by the filter?

Question

What happens if email is delayed by the filter?

Answer

Delays of 10-15 minutes are very common shortly after setting up the spam-filter for the domain.

This is a result of the self learning system of the filter: it does not know the receiving mail server yet, and will grey-list the e-mail first. The next delivery attempt of the sending mail server (after a minimum of 10 minutes), the filter will accept the e-mail and process with the next validation steps.

After receiving 5 to 10 e-mails, the recipient mail-server will be recognised and the delay will disappears.

What happens if the mail server goes offline?

Question

What happens if the mail-server is temporarily disconnected?

Answer

In case the e-mail could not be delivered on the mail-server(s), Spamexperts will retry it according to the standards.

The following scheme is used for this:

• During the first 2 hours, every 15 minute the delivery is retried
• The next 14 hours, this interval is increased with a factor of 1.5 (15 minutes, 22½ minutes, 34 minutes, ...)
• Then, delivery will be retried every 6 hours
• If after 4 days the e-mail could not be delivered, the sender will be informed

If the mail-server has a short downtime, most messages will be received within 15 minutes. When the server has a longer downtime, delivery can be delayed some longer.

E-mail only permanently bounces if the receiving mail-server is not available for 4 days.

You can see in the Delivery queue in the Spamexperts control panel which e-mails have not yet been delivered, and for what reason.

Why is there no subject in the logs?

Question

Why can't I see the subject in the mail logs?

Answer

The major part of the e-mails is blocked on the SMTP level (%%258%%); at this point of the delivery, no subject is known by the filter yet, so it cannot be shown in the logs.

Because of this uniformity, the subjects are not shown in any of the emails.

Outgoing filtering

How does the outgoing filtering work?

Question:

What is outgoing email filter and how it works?

Answer:

The outbound email filtering prevents spam from being unknowingly sent out of your network through
a compromised account or script. You can protect your entire network by monitoring all outgoing email traffic, identifying and locking down compromised user accounts. Outgoing filtering helps you to keep your network free of outbound spam and IP addresses away from blacklists.

Out going filter work as follow.

SpamExperts outbound spam and virus filter is a gateway solution. Activation is done via the web interface or by using the API directly. Configuration is done through a smart host setup where all
outbound emails from your network are re-routed through the filtering systems, before going out to the internet. The alternative is to authenticate on a per user basis where the filtering systems are directly used as outgoing SMTP servers. 

Once configured outgoing e-mails are no longer sent directly to the receiving mail server, but are re-routed via the SpamExperts cluster. If the e-mail is valid, it's forwarded to the final recipient. If it's spam, it is blocked at the cluster.

DEPLOYMENT

The actual filtering of the messages is done on the highly redundant SpamExperts Hosted Cloud. This SaaS solution is fully managed, maintained, and 24/7/365 monitored by SpamExperts.

CONFIGURATION

For new users the outgoing server that should be configured is 683.smtp.antispamcloud.com on port 587.

For users that still use the bundled solution of SpamExperts the following outgoing server applies:

outgoing.mail.registrar.eu on port 587.

Of course the sending server should authenticate itself to the cluster. Authentication can be done on 2 levels: as domain user or as IP user:

• Domain user
  For every filter that is created, Openprovider automatically creates a user for outgoing e-mail. Use those data to authenticate at the SMTP server. Now your e-mail will be filtered.
• IP user
  It is also possible to filter all e-mail from a certain server, for example your shared hosting server. Do this by creating an IP user: there is no need to log in with username and password to the SMTP server, as the cluster will accept all connections from the specified IP address. Please note that only a limited number of IP users is available and this number depends on your bundle size.

How to order and setup outgoing spam filter?

Question

How to order and setup outgoing spam filter?

Answer:

To order a outgoing filter you need to follow the next steps:

1) Navigate to RCP Dashboard (Reseller Control Panel) >> Spam filtering (SpamExperts)

2)  Click on sub menu "Order new filter"
                       

3) In the next screen:

• Enter the domain name.
• Select "Outgoing filter"
• Enter mail server address

4) Save the filter:

To configure your outgoing Spamfilter, you need to use the credentials to login to https://login.antispamcloud.com or simply click on the "Go to spam filter control panel" button to login directly from Openprovider Control Panel.

In the SpamExperts control panel, navigate to Outgoing > Manage users

From the manage users page, you can create a new user using using any of three forms of authentication, via IP address or IP range, via user, or via domain. If you don't know which authentication you need, we recommend referring to the SpamExperts knowledge base article Outgoing Users/Authentication Methods.

Note: If the domains are not having a static/fixed IP address for SMTP, use the "Authenticating Domain" option.

To configure your sender policy framework (SPF) you'll be using the "hosted cloud solution" for the Openprovider license the following configurations apply:

• SMTP hostname: 683.smtp.antispamcloud.com on port 587
• SPF record "v=spf1 include:spf.antispamcloud.com -all"

If you have questions about how to set up a particular mail transfer agent (MTA) the SpamExperts knowledge base article MTA configuration offers a detailed guide.

For more information about the outgoing spam filter you can read the knowledgebase article from SpamExperts.

Is it possible to activate the option "valid sender address required"?

Question:

Is it possible to activate the option "valid sender address required"?

Answer:

The sender verification is usually off and isn't something that is normally available on the Hosted Cloud.

This toggle is available with the Local cloud but not for general usage with the hosted solution.

Furthermore, it is recommended to only disable sender verification as a last resort, with all other options exhausted. The sender verification is an important anti spam check and should be used for optimal message filtering.

Outgoing mail is quarantined

When an outgoing mail is quarantined, please check the reason. Using the outgoing log search, the mail can be found. Using the "Columns to be displayed" option, you can customize the log output and add "Sub Class" and "Extra Class." These columns will give more information on why the mail is blocked.

If these columns show the class "contains-macro" it means that there is an attachment in the mail that is often used by spammers. Since Spamexperts offers a shared anti-spam solution and want to keep their server reputation healthy, they do not permit any file types that are known to be commonly used by spammers, such as the sending of macros and exe files in attachments.

We recommend end users do not mimic the kinds of behaviour seen by spammers to prevent any unnecessary delays in mail. Possible options are to use password protected zip files for any one off email attachments or any number of other common file transfer solutions if these kinds of files are genuine and shared regularly.

Outgoing quarantined mail can only be released by Spamexperts themselves. If the mail is quarantined for another reason, we can have the mail evaluated and possibly released if you contact us. Otherwise it's advised to check the error code and adjust the mail accordingly.

Which SPF record to use with a spam filter?

Question

Which SPF record should one use for a spam filter?

Answer

If you want to create an SPF record for your domain when using Openprovider platform you can use the following value.

"v=spf1 include:spf.antispamcloud.com -all"

If you are still using our older bundled solution, then you can use this SPF record:

"v=spf1 a:spf.spamexperts.registrar.eu -all"

It includes all our servers and will allow your users to not be flagged as spammers when sending emails.

For more information about the SPF record, please refer to this article.

🇪🇸 Cómo configurar el filtro de spam de salida

1. In the control panel, click on "Spam Filters / Add New Filter".

2. On the next screen, add the domain, select "Outbound Filter," and add the mail server. Click Save.

3. Configure your SMTP server credentials by accessing the SpamExpert filter. You can do this by clicking the blue button in the control panel.

4) Dentro del panel, en Outgoing, ves a Manage users.

Here you need to configure 1 of the 3 forms of authentication.

We recommend using the Authenticating Domain, where the username will be the domain and where you can set the password.

5) Now you will need to configure the mail server's SMTP to send emails through the filter.

The outgoing server must be configured for  683.smtp.antispamcloud.com  for port  587 .

For authentication, you must set the username and password.

6) Once this is done, please make sure to update your spf to include spamexperts.

For this, add the following spf:

"include:spf.antispamcloud.com -all"

or add :683.submission.antispamcloud.com  to your existing spf record.

FAQ: Spam Experts extension for Plesk

How to configure Spam Experts extension for Plesk in Openprovider?

Answer

• Create an account in Openprovider and increase balance
• Order a Spam Experts extension in Openprovider via one of the ways below:
  • order a new Plesk license with Spam Experts extension RCP>Order new license>Plesk 12/Onyx/Obsidian keys>Add more features
  • order Spam Experts extension separately by navigating to RCP>Order new license>Third-party extension keys
    
  • upgrade existing Plesk license: RCP>Overview orders> %%License number%%>modify
• Find Spam Experts extension activation key: RCP>Overview orders>%%Spam Experts license number%%>Activation code
  
• Use the key to activate extension in Plesk installation
• Contact Openprovider Support to create a sub-admin Spam Experts account, providing following information:
  • Reseller id
  • Email address
  • Preferred password (optional))
• Once account is ready, follow extension configuration instructions:
  • For Windows
  • For Linux
  • Credentials:
    • Email and password (provided by Openprovider support)
    • API URL: https://api.antispamcloud.com
    • API hostname: api.antispamcloud.com
    • MX:
      • Primary MX: mx.spamexperts.com
      • Secondary MX: fallbackmx.spamexperts.eu
      • Third MX: lastmx.spamexperts.net

NB: filters can not be added to sub-admin account via Openprovider reseller control panel. Filters must be created via Plesk web interface directly, in order to be manageable via Spam Experts extension.

Filters appear in Openprovider reseller control panel and billed during up to 24 hours after filter creation via extension.

What is Spam Experts extension for Plesk & How SE extension for Plesk works?

1. What is Spam Experts extension for Plesk?

Purchasing a Plesk extension allows enabling a limited amount of various Spam Experts' services:

• Incoming email filtering
• Outgoing email filtering
• Email Archiving

The extension doesn't come with spam filters by default, only provides means to enable them. Filters must be purchased separately.

Filters can be purchased from Plesk directly or from other Spam expert distributors, like Openprovider.

The extension can be configured to work with a Spam Experts provider of one's choosing.

Instructions to configure extension for use with Openprovider