in reply to Re^4: Determine if domain is actually used for email
in thread Determine if domain is actually used for email

Good to know. Thanks. "Safe bet" still sounds like gambling. :P

  • Comment on Re^5: Determine if domain is actually used for email

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Re^6: Determine if domain is actually used for email
by vit (Friar) on Oct 05, 2011 at 13:08 UTC
    Seeing if the server is listening on port 25 and is responding in a manner consistent with a SMTP server and not giving a 521 status code is a pretty safe bet though.

    So am I right that, although not 100% reliable, this might be a good way to check if a domain has an actual email with no risk to be caught as spammer? Is there a code which implements this approach?

      Depends how many servers you are looking at and how good the IDS is on the site. If it was enough of a problem, I could see using that fingerprint to tag a site to watch behavior more closely. ISTR discussions about this many years ago on SPAM-L. Perhaps browsing the archives for doorknocking, testing addresses, and some similar search terms might be useful.

      --MidLifeXis