gmail

This is a question I get a lot. Does Gmail use any blocklists? Or, somebody will tell me that they’re having Gmail issues, and they’ve plugged their own IP address into an online blocklist lookup tool, and they are sure that any results found (blocklisting issues) must somehow be part of the underlying cause of their deliverability woes. Except, that’s just about never the case. Here’s why.There are a zillion blocklists out there. Speaking specifically just about DNSBLs (IP-based blocking lists), there’s a good 90+ of them. But blocklists are a bit like blogs,  in that anybody can publish them and the fact that it’s been published doesn’t mean that anybody is guaranteed to be actually looking at the what has been published. The net here is that there are a lot of blocklists that, if your IP or domain ends up listed by them, this does not mean that

Axios, the Washington Post, and others are reporting that the Gmail political email pilot program is coming to an end.Axios buries the lede on this one — putting the important bit (to me) at the very end: “Google’s pilot email program, which saw more than 100 political committees participate, will end January 31, and the company is evaluating next steps.”More from the Washington Post: “The company will let the program sunset at the end of January instead of prolonging it, Google’s lawyers said in a filing on Monday.” The filing is an attempt to get the RNC “unfair spam filtering” lawsuit against Google dismissed. How the shutdown of the pilot program ties to that effort, I am not equipped enough to say at the moment, but I’ll be curious to learn more.

Multiple folks are reporting Gmail delivery issues today — both “571” style spam bounce blocks and spam folder placement. Some of the affected folks seem to be sending corporate mail, outbound from Proofpoint or Microsoft O365 hosted environments. It happens to some folks from time to time, but there are enough reports of it out in the wild that I think that perhaps Google released a significant Gmail filter update within the past 1-3 days and that it might be a bit buggy. It already sounds like some of those same folks are now seeing improvement. If you’re affected, be sure to submit sample messages via the Gmail Sender Contact Form — though they do not always respond, they do review every ticket, and in a scenario like this, sending them data and feedback is important. (Click here to learn more about that sender form process.)Of course, you need to

The other day, I ran across a complaint on Linkedin. “Just saw another email go to the Promotions Folder with DKIM, SPF, and DMARC set up perfectly. Stop telling people this will fix their e-mail problems!” It’s not the first time I’ve heard this, and I can understand why the author is frustrated. But, it’s important not to miss the true point — email authentication will help to improve inbox delivery. Because it does! But there’s a nuanced explanation to go along with that. The devil truly is in the details.Email authentication is fantastic. SPF and DKIM both allow you to set yourself up as YOU in the eyes of mailbox providers — as opposed to just being one of the many clients of ESP or CRM platform X, based on a shared IP address or shared DKIM domain. This is a good thing, but it’s just the start.Setting yourself

I finally broke down and did it. I set myself up as my own mailbox provider. I’ve got some of my inbound mail (I’ve got multiple addresses and domains) pointed at my new infrastructure and I’ve had lots of fun these past few weeks getting back into the role of postmaster.Why did I do it? All of the talk about Google potentially letting political senders bypass Gmail spam filters started to annoy me, first of all. And beyond my political concerns, Gmail allows a lot of mail through to my spam folder that I wish they would just block outright.  So, with my own server, I can block whatever domains and IPs I want.I also wanted to bust the myth that hobbyist and small volume mail servers are effectively locked out of Gmail. I know from experience that it’s not true, and I wanted to have a server or service I

Google and various news outlets are reporting that Gmail had a significant outage today (Saturday, December 10th). Google reports that as of 4:16 PM UTC (10:16 AM US central time) things are on the mend, but that there’s a backlog of messages to be delivered.I can’t tell if senders found inbound delivery attempts delayed with 4xx errors, or if Google servers accepted messages then sat on them. Message delivery to the inbox, however, was definitely delayed for folks (observed by myself, too), regardless of what the backend systems were doing.

Blake E. Reid, writing for LAWFLARE breaks down the legal merits of the Republic National Committee’s lawsuit against Google over Gmail’s spam filtering. Starting with, “the trouble with the RNC’s pointillistic arguments is that they invoke a bunch of different laws that apply different rules to different kinds of platforms in different contexts.” It’s a good read and I found it full of insight. Check it out here.

What’s up with that Gmail political email pilot program, previously revealed by Axios and discussed by my friends Jennifer Nespola Lantz and Travis Murray (and me, and others)? Strangely enough, according to the Washington Post, Democrats are flocking to it, and Republicans seem to be avoiding it. Was this a bluff that they weren’t expecting Gmail to call? After all, a number of noisy Republicans complained about, and asked for a way through the spam filtering; they were offered such a path, and don’t seem to want to use it. Instead, the Republican National Committee is suing Google.Color me confused.Why do this now? It won’t be decided in time to affect midterm elections. It makes the whole thing seem like bit of a ploy, focused on publicity. And perhaps a bad faith one, given the opportunity the GOP was already offered to be able to bypass Gmail’s spam filters.And who

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

Today’s guest post comes from my Kickbox colleague, Jennifer Nespola Lantz. Don’t forget to check out her posts over on the Kickbox blog. Take it away, Jen!Yesterday, a colleague shared a link, a much anticipated link, a link that adds clarity to a topic that caused some hair to catch on fire (mine in particular), some ire and anger, much speculation, and little support. That topic: Gmail’s Political Pilot Program or as Gmail has coined it Gmail Verified Sender Program Pilot (some speculate there are reasons for this, but let me learn my lesson and not talk about that just yet).I was hot on the topic when I first read about it and quick to comment judge. I was also quick to jump right into this newly shared link, filled with (what I hoped was) answers to some lingering questions. And what an enjoyable read it was. Not because it was