Block emails from/to specific address-not working
I am running SBS 2003 SP2 and am trying to block a specific email address. I do not want this particular address to be able to send email to the domain, and do not want anyone on the domain to be able to send email to the same address. I have set the Recipient Filtering and Sender Filtering to include the email address: example@example.com. I have alsochecked "Apply Sender Filter" and "Apply Recipient Filter" options on the virtual SMTP server. Also have stopped the virtual smtp and restarted it. The email that I am trying to block still comes in and when I test sending an email to that address, it reaches it successfully (I am testing it with my personal email). I have read many articles and forums and do not seem to find the answer that is causing my issue. Any help is very appreciated!
June 11th, 2008 12:24am

Hi, I understand that you would like to block one specify email address which send the email to the domain and also block outbound email to that specify email address. Regarding this issue, please take the following steps to troubleshoot it. First we need to block the email come in from that specify email address: Open ESM, expand the Organization, expand Global Settings, right click Message Delivery, click Properties, in the Sender Filtering tab, please add the specify email address, such as example@example.com, ensure Drop connection if address matches filter option is checked. Then apply with this configuration on SMTP VS, restart SMTP VS. Second block the outbound email to that specify email address: Please first go into ADUC, create a contact named example, modify the email address to SMTP address: example@example.com Then right click the example account, click Properties, in the Exchange General tab, in the Message restrictions area, check Only from: click Add button, please add itself as requirement. After that, please test this issue. Thanks Allen
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June 12th, 2008 11:59am

Hello Allen--and thank you for the reply. The steps you kindly guided me through are the same as those I already performed, however I did progress some. I noticed in my SMTP VS that there are 3 options under "IP address", the options are: "All Unassigned" "(internal ip address)" "(external ip address)" Where of course I have not listed the exact IP Addresses, however that is what is the options. I noticed that when I select on the option in the list, and click Advanced, and check the different filters, that it applies only to that 1I selected from the list above, and resets the other 2. So if I select the option of my Internal IP, and click Advanced, and check the filters for Recipient and Sender, hit apply, than go back in by selecting from the list above External IP and click Advanced, nothing will be checked. I can then check the filters I want, apply this. If I re-enter the first one I configured (in this case it was my Internal IP) and click Advanced, nothing is checked. So it resets whichever one I do not have currently selected. Moving on, having noticed this, I reset it to "All Unassigned" and set the filters and applied. I found that the Recipient Filter (the filter that blocks outbound emails to a specific address) DOES work...the email never reaches the filtered address. However the Sender Filter is not working. The emails are still delivering to Outlook that are From the filtered address. Something I want to add to this is that in our environment 1 server is running SMTP and Exchange, where a seperate server that is outside our facility is running POP. It is a Unix server and I have attempted 2 unique methods of blocking email addresses on that level in the cPanel--neither work, and I have a Unix administrator working on that to determine what is causing that. But the filters do not work in the cPanel, and the SpamAssassin tool is not working either. In the meantime, I am certain there must be a way to block email addresses on the Exchange Server regardless of which processes the POP or SMTP...but I have never claimed to know everything about anything, so all suggestions/tips are welcome! Thank you all!
June 13th, 2008 10:15pm

Hi, Before going on, I would like to confirm whether you have deployed Front-Sever in the environment. Please let me know the whole environment of your network. Have you configure any SMTP Gateway or Smarthost to accept and send the email? Actually, the Recipient Filter could not be used to prevent the outbound email unless there have more than one Exchange server . It is just used to block the messages that are sent to the Internal recipient rather than external address. It is applied with the incoming email rather than outboud email. Regarding the option of the SMTP VS was changed when assigning the different IP address, please understand that an SMTP virtual server is defined by a unique combination of an IP address and port number. The SMTP virtual server listens on its assigned IP address for incoming communications. The default SMTP virtual server uses all available IP addresses on the server and uses port 25 for inbound connections. Thus, when we changed the IP address, this signifies that the settings is different. If you want the SMTP virtual server to respond to connection requests for all IP addresses that are configured on the computer, click (All Unassigned). Thanks Allen
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June 17th, 2008 10:17am

Hello Allen, I feel like a duck out of water with this all because while it is quickly becoming the focus of my education and studies, it is certainly not my forte yet. I have done a few searches to find out how I can answer your question, whether we are using Front-Server, I have not foud a lot of information on this, I have some guesses as to what it is...but don't want to embarrass myself here . The environment in a nut-shell is this: "Server 1" is a locally installed network server, that runs SBS '03 R2, it is our domain controller, and it runs the SMTP, Exchange, ISA Firewall, and others. It connects to the POP server ("Server 2") which is located outside the facility, and is running Unix--Redhat, and it has the established domain name of our emails (what I mean to say is that our domain email addresses are example@example.com, so the "Server 1" that is the SMTP Server is named company.example.local, and on "Server 2" it has the registered domain on it along with the POP service and the domain is example.com. I know this all sounds weird, and I trust you understand why I am not posting the actual names of the servers, however I am sure it could cut back some confusion. If at any time it would help resolve or provide a quicker answer, to have all the actual names, please let me know and through email or phone I would be happy to provide those details to an individual. So the SMTP server has a smart host that it uses and is, mail.example.com. Also a local bridgehead of:company (which if you followed my examples above of the SMTP servers name "company.example.local", the same name that is populated for "company" is the same as the local bridgehead under Server). And Virtual Server=Default SMTP Virtual Server. I understand now what you said regarding the IP Addresses that are configured on the SMTP VS. Thank you for that, I will put this back to All Unassigned and re-check the options necessary. Thank you for any help you can provide!
June 18th, 2008 10:05pm

If anyone has suggestions on this, I would greatly appreciate it, I am still not able to achieve the needs. Here is an update: I found how to block inbound emails. I do this via the cPanel on the Unix server that runs the POP Server, there is a utility in there for filters and that is how I am able to block inbound. For outbound I am still not able to block emails, that are sent from anyone within the domain, to a specific email address. I really do not care if it is just deleted, or if it is forwarded to a different email address (which is the prefered method), or if it is pipe-lined to another program. However I can achieve the goal of making it so that no one within the domain can send an email to a specific email address, this is what I would like to receive help with. Thank you to all who have helped thus far.
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July 10th, 2008 10:59pm

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