Very old ic24.net email

[#1]

We use a very old ic24.net email account. For some reason all our outgoing emails have stopped working. We can receive emails fine but not send them through a laptop, phones, tablet. None work. I have spoken to plusnet and they have reset my password for me and I have reinstalled the email accounts using the settings given on the website but still no joy in sending an email. We get this message when we try to send:-

recipient rejected - relay denied

We use apple mail but I've tried to set up the account on outlook and it tells me

Unable to log in. Please check your SMTP outgoing password.

If we use webmail we can send an email no problem.

Any ideas gratefully received

[#2]

@amlandmjones are you trying to send from a Plusnet broadband connection or via another ISP broadband ?

[#3]

Thanks for coming back to me so quickly. We are using Sky fibre for our sins.

[#4]

Then I suspect you have not configured the mail client to use authentication for the outgoing(SMTP) server. You should use the same authentication details as for the incoming server.

Webmail will send because its located on the Plusnet network and so does not rqeuire authentication. If you are sending from an off-network (in your case Sky) IP address then you need to authenticate with the outgoing mail server.

[#5]

Hi thanks for the reply. I've reinstalled the accounts completely using the same authentication password for both incoming and out going emails and used the set up given on the plusnet website eg relay.plus.net and port as 587 see attached. This all seemed to work fine till about 4 days ago but now no outgoing emails at all

[#6]

This is setup

[#7]

This has the symptoms of having acquired an abused Sky IP address. Will the phone send emails when NOT connected via Sky?

Most email applications throw up a “password” error for all connection failure reasons, thereby masking the real issue. I’d usually recommend running a SMTP diagnostic test … but I cannot post that guidance from the phone version of this website.

However, “relay not permitted” somewhat suggests that no attempt was made to log on.

All that considered relay.plus.net is not the advised SMTP server for ic24 - see https://community.plus.net/t5/Email/How-to-change-your-outgoing-server-on-a-mail-client/m-p/1606155#...

[#8]

@Townman I'm not familiar with the Apple mail client but shouldn't that last drop down box 'Authentication', as shown on @amlandmjones last screen shot, be set to 'Normal password' ?

[#9]

Thanks. Yes if you switch off wifi and use the mobile network in this case Smarty, emails will send through the account. This suggests a Sky internet issue? I did try swapping to mail.ic24.net for the smtp server but it wouldn't verify the account?

[#10]

Thanks for responding, if I try to ask it to say password the account doesn't get verified for some reason

[#11]

Thanks. Yes if you switch off wifi and use the mobile network in this case Smarty, emails will send through the account. This suggests a Sky internet issue?

@amlandmjones Yes, that suggests there's nothing wrong with your email configuration, rather its a problem with the IP address that Sky has allocated to you. Likely its acquired a poor reputation from someone who it was previously allocated to.

Usually this sort of reputation problem disappears after 24 hrs.

[#12]

Or switching the router off for 2 hours … and getting a new IP address. That’s much the same as the problem “just appearing 4 days ago”.

[#13]

Thanks for the suggestions 'm going switch router off for a while and see what heppens

[#14]

Sadly that didn't work either. No idea what to do anymore.

[#15]

OK I'm now at my desk - try this SMTP diagnostic method...

Test SMTP authentication

Email programs often report username / password error for issues not actually related to those being wrong, but for other connectivity issues. Such can be very frustrating when you are convinced that they are correct. Testing SMTP authentication through a command line interface can deliver a more precise error message. The following describes how to do this using TELNET.

This is not difficult, but you need the following resources which might be unfamiliar...

1. TELNET - this might need installing as an additional option, for Windows see enabling TELNET.
2. A code64 encoder / decoder such as this.

You can use TELNET to communicate direct with the SMTP server as follows...

Open the code64 encoder in a web browser and leave ready for use in the following steps.

Launch a windows command line window (DOS window) - press windows-key+R - type CMD into the run box - click OK

Enter...

telnet relay.plus.net 587

Press enter. Note if you use one of the other brand email services, use the appropriate SMTP server name for that brand. In response to SMTP server I'm here message, say 'HELLO'...

EHLO relay.plus.net

The SMTP server will then report what it can do after which tell the server you wish to authenticate...

AUTH login

The server should return the following, which is a base64 encoded string that requires your username:

334 VXNlcm5hbWU6

Use the code64 encoder to encode your username and paste it into the telnet window and press enter. For example:

bXl1c2VybmFtZQ==

The server should return the following, which is a base64 encoded string that requires your password:

334 UGFzc3dvcmQ6

Paste the base64 encoded password for the username. For example:

bXlwYXNzd29yZA==

The server will then report success or failure, any failure message should clearly indicate the reason for the failure. If the reason for the failure is not clear, please report back the message.

Close the SMTP / TELNET session by entering

quit

The session should look something similar to the below wherein your input is in bold...

220 avasout03 smtp relay.plus.net
EHLO relay.plus.net
250-avasout03 hello [your IP address], pleased to meet you
250-HELP
250-AUTH LOGIN PLAIN
250-SIZE 104857600
250-PIPELINING
250-8BITMIME
250-STARTTLS
250 OK
AUTH LOGIN
334 VXNlcm5hbWU6
bXl1c2VybmFtZQ==
334 UGFzc3dvcmQ6
bXlwYXNzd29yZA==
235 ... authentication succeeded
quit
221 avasout03 smtp closing connection
Connection to host lost.

Here are some examples of failure responses...

535 ...authentication rejected [as username / password is wrong]
535 ...authentication rejected as source IP has a poor reputation
535 Too many SMTP auth failures. Please try again later.