18
Dec
Email from outlook.com servers failing SPF records
Over the last 24 hours we have seen a few instances where valid email from Outlook.com servers has been rejected by our customers MDaemon and SecurityGateway servers due to SPF record checks.
The emails getting rejected do appear to be valid messages but have been arriving from an IP address not included in the sending servers SPF records. The common factor here is that all the sending domains are using outlook.com services.
14:28 /
MDaemon
Cyren's quarterly Internet Threat Trends reports are a MUST READ for IT professionals and MSP's alike and this one is no exception.
You could be forgiven for not recognising the Cyren name as they've 
Alt-N Technologies, BackupAssist, MailStore....they were all there. And that's not all, we were even fortunate enough to bag a couple of inspirational guest 
Today's nugget of MDaemon wisdom comes from conversations I've had with a small number of customers reporting they're unable to send outbound email to specific recipients.
Upon closer inspection of the error in the SMTP (OUT) log, there's a message reading "SSL negotiation failed".
October, as you'll probably know, is the unofficial 'silly season' for IT gatherings in the UK.
It's around this time each year, vendors, exhibition companies and industry bodies go all out competing for the attention of the IT support companies and MSP's they'd like at their events.
It may only be labelled a point release, but version 14.5 is absolutely crammed with improvements, highlighted by the somewhat 'epic' release notes linked below.
This release sees the addition of 
Configuring any Web service to work over HTTP using SSL is a good idea.
We certainly recommend it for BackupAssist's Multi-site Manager (BAMM) and in this post I'll show you how to create an SSL certificate you can then bind this kind of service to.
If you have ever suspected that a slow performing server is down to slow access to a hard drive you may have started searching the web for a tool to help diagnose the root of the problem.
What you might not know is that Windows has a very handy built-in tool for doing just that and can provide some excellent real-time statistics.
As with a lot of new technologies the real power comes from when they are used by the masses.
Sender Policy Framework or SPF is no longer a new technology and is generally widely used to help preserve email domain reputation for large organisations, but it's as well-known about in the Small to Medium sized business end of the email market.
Spammers know this and have started to target domains that do not have valid SPF records as they can most easily be used to spoof and send spam claiming to be from valid companies. Often these types of spoofed email are used in phishing attacks to then harvest more valuable data, so the smaller companies that can adopt the use of SPF the better.