Tell me more ×
IT Security Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for IT security professionals. It's 100% free, no registration required.
up vote 0 down vote favorite

I get a lot of the following type messages:

Message delivery to the remote domain 'particular domain or IP address' failed for the following reason: The remote server did not respond to a connection attempt

I have locked down the smtp server, or at least I think I have - I also don't allow relaying.

What are these messages? Are they something that need to be handled? Can I prevent them, if so, how?

Specs:

  • Windows Server 2003 Enterprise SP2
  • Windows SMTPSVC
share|improve this question

1 Answer

up vote 0 down vote accepted

It means that whatever service is connecting to your SMTP server attempted to send an email to a domain it couldn't deliver to. This is fairly normal stuff for an SMTP server, assuming you use it to send messages to users in various domains.

You can turn on logging and see what's failing: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/303738

share|improve this answer
I would understand it attempting to connect to an SMTP server when sending mail out from this particular server. However, it's not a publicly available server per se, only processes running on the server send email via this smtp server. We also receive our domain email via this server via the P3 Server - which I understand uses the SMTP server. – Android Addict Jan 15 at 17:43
The domains, of which there are hundreds, are not domains that we have any business sending email to. So, having said that, what else would cause this log event? Could it be SPAM that is getting sent to us? – Android Addict Jan 15 at 17:44
BTW, we have done the logging thing before and it does not tell us anything that we do not already know. What we want to know is why these get generated if WE have never sent mail to any of those domains/IPs? – Android Addict Jan 15 at 17:46

Your Answer

 
discard

By posting your answer, you agree to the privacy policy and terms of service.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.