This week I continue my series on e-mail deliverability inspired by the Lyris Inc panel featuring Michael Kelly of Click Mail Marketing, Craig Spiezie of the Online Trust Alliance, and David Fowler of Lyris Technologies.

In the Beginning

When the internet began, it was dominated by academic and government agencies.  Such agencies had little reason to hide their own identities or mimic the identities of others.  As a result, a system was built that made it easy to apply domain names (like @stanford.edu or @whitehouse.gov) as shorthand for the actual IP address used to route electronic communications.

Authentication

As use of the internet spread to a wider audience, spammers and con artists realized that they could hide their identity and take advantage of the trust of others by claiming that their IP addresses were associated with well known websites.

Authentication procedures give the e-mail servers that receive mail a way to check and see if the messages that claim to have come from your company actually did start there.  This is useful because it can prevent other peoples scams and spam from impacting your own online reputation.

Types of Authentication

There are currently three commonly accepted methods for authenticating e-mail: SPF, SenderID, and DKIM.  For the best security you therefore need to make sure that your e-mail can be authenticated regardless of which method your recipients use.

Not at This Address

If you have multiple domain names, you should make sure that all of them are set up for proper authentication - even those you never intend to use for e-mail.  Remember, it’s not just enough to prove that your e-mails do come from your company - you also want to demonstrate that outsiders e-mails do not.  If you’re not going to use one of your domain names for e-mail, you should have that recorded in the DNS information so that nobody can squat on your digital property.

For more tips on e-mail deliverability see:

E-Mail Deliverability I: Compliance