bimi

Hey, I’ll be participating in the next Certified Senders Alliance (CSA) webinar, where I’ll be chatting with Sebastian Kluth (CSA) and Karsten Vendler (LEGO Group) about where DMARC and BIMI are today and where we think this is all headed. It’s sure to be a fun discussion and I’ll have some new data to share on DMARC and BIMI adoption. Please join us? It’s on June 1st at 10:00 am US central time and you can register for it here. I hope to see you there!* I also promise to annoy Karsten with many LEGO related questions, like, is it truly fun to work for LEGO? Do you get many free LEGO blocks? Will you get me some free LEGO blocks? And more.

There are enough BIMI questions floating out there nowadays, that I thought it’d be good timing to put together a BIMI mini-FAQ. If you did not already know, BIMI (Brand Indicators for Message Identification) is a way to attach a logo to your email sending domain and with recent Gmail developments (not to mention, Apple support), it’s poised to become rather a big thing. And assuming you did know what BIMI was, let’s jump right into the FAQ:What’s that new blue checkmark thing at Gmail? How do I get that?Gmail recently announced that for senders who implement BIMI, they’ll show a little blue checkmark next to the sender’s email address, showing that the sender has been validated. You’ll get that by implementing BIMI (with a VMC). Read more about that here.What’s a VMC again and where do I get one of those?VMC means “Verified Mark Certificate” and it’s a certification you

Hey, look at that! Gmail is starting to show a blue checkmark next to the sender name when the sender’s domain passes BIMI checks. And they provide helpful pop-up info when you mouse over the blue checkmark. This rolls out starting today (May 3, 2023) so if you don’t see it today, you will likely see it soon. Read more about it here. It’s yet another reason that it’s time to jump on the BIMI train!

A new day brings us news of yet another mailbox provider supporting BIMI! This time it’s Onet Poczta (Onet Post), the email service of Onet.pl, the largest Polish web portal and online news platform. They now support BIMI, they require VMC, and they’ve got a help page here.The AuthIndicators Working Group (the group behind the BIMI specification) has updated their mailbox provider support graphic accordingly.As best I can tell, Onet Poctz email domains include: op.pl, onet.pl, vp.pl, poczta.onet.pl, autograf.pl, buziaczek.pl, onet.com.pl and amorki.pl[ H/T Natalia Zacholska and Matthew Vernhout ]

It’s been a while since I published a current state of BIMI support across the internet service provider (ISP) and mailbox provider (MBP) community, so here you go: this is the current status of BIMI across the email ecosystem, accurate as of April 2023.What is BIMI? Brand Indicators for Message Identification (BIMI) is an email spec that allows email senders to display a brand or company logo alongside email messages when displayed in different email applications and webmail platforms. It helps to promote trust and security by requiring proper underpinnings of email authentication and a Yahoo study indicated that the logo display can increase chances that recipients will interact with your email messages. The BIMI specification is overseen by a collaborative email industry group known as the AuthIndicators Working Group, comprised of email senders, email receivers, email security and deliverability experts.Which mailbox providers and webmail platforms will display BIMI logos?Supports

Estonian webhost and mailbox provider Zone now supports BIMI and will display a sender logo in Zone Webmail, if they’re able to. VMC is required. Find more details here.Doing a quick check of my domain data, I think that Zone’s primary email domains are:webmail.zone.eezone.com.eezone.eezone.euzone.fizone.ltzone.lvThey also host email for more than a thousand other domains for customers; all relevant domains have an MX record pointing to zonemx.eu.

Normally now would be a good time for me to provide a write up on the current status of mailbox provider support for BIMI, but my Kickbox colleague Jennifer Nespola Lantz beat me to it, so I’ll just link to her very informative blog post over on the Kickbox blog, where she details which mailbox providers support BIMI today, and which ones require a VMC or not.And don’t forget to check the BIMI section here on Spam Resource to find even more info on BIMI sender logos.BIMI is becoming kind of a big deal!

Check it out — it’s our first taste of BIMI on iOS outside of beta. Apple iOS users who upgrade to iOS 16 can now see a BIMI logo associated with an email send, depending on what mailbox provider they use. All four of these CNN Newsletter signup emails were opened and viewed on the default Apple mail client in iOS 16.0.2, and as you can see, iCloud and Fastmail users get shown the BIMI logo for CNN! You’ll note that no logo is displayed for the Yahoo and Gmail subscribers, even though both platforms support BIMI (and CNN has the Gmail-required VMC in place). Why Fastmail and not Gmail or Yahoo? I suspect that Fastmail was quickest to implement an updated “authentication results” header that includes information about the BIMI logo checks, and I don’t think Gmail and Yahoo are including that information. Yet? It seems likely that they’ll catch

We knew that BIMI support was coming to Apple iOS and MacOS. And now, Apple has published a support page: Prepare your email server for BIMI support in Apple Mail. Reading through the guide, it sounds like support might go beyond just Apple iCloud (mac.com, me.com, icloud.com) domains, if other mailbox providers structure their headers properly. If this support is client-based and not recipient domain based, that could really make things interesting. Here’s hoping I’m reading that right.For more on Apple’s rollout of BIMI support, check out this update from the Authindicators (BIMI) Working Group.

Back in June, Jennifer Nespola Lantz and I hosted a Kickbox Live session where we explained what a BIMI logo is, which ISPs support it, and we gave our recommendations on moving forward with a BIMI sender logo. And we even took time to answer a bunch of questions. And the info we shared then is still the latest and greatest with regard to BIMI status, so if you’re curious as to what this whole BIMI logo thing is and what you should be doing about it, feel free to head on over to the Kickbox blog and check it out.And don’t forget, I’ve got a whole BIMI section here on Spam Resource, including current and upcoming (Apple) mailbox provider support, what to do if you’re seeing the wrong logo, how to “fake it ’til you make it” at Gmail, learn how to create an animated logo, and more!