There is a huge difference in the versions of Net::SMTP between 2009 and 2016 and you are fiddling in your post which parts which did not even exist in 2009 (i.e. SSL support). If you really want to have help in your problem please ask a new question with a proper problem description, way to reproduce the problem and the Perl and Net::SMTP version you use. Based on this one could actually try to help you.