Mail Deliverability Error: Reverse DNS (PTR) Problem Exist

[gix0970]

There is only 1 domain. Dedicated server is hosted at hostgator and 2 months ago I moved the DNS to another hosting provider.
Everything was fine. SPF, DKIM could be verified. 5 days ago I ran Mail Delivery and received this error:

The system uses an alternate HELO of “xxx.domain-name.com” when sending mail from the “domain-name.com” domain.
The system sends the domain “xxx.domain-name.com” in the SMTP handshake for this domain’s email. “xxx.domain-name.com” does not resolve to any IP addresses.

To fix this problem, contact your system administrator and request that they create a DNS “A” record for “xxx.domain-name.com” whose value is “x.x.x.x”.

However email delivery is working fine. SPF can be verified but not DKIM. Results from leafdns looks ok.


3 days ago, I added dns_server 127.0.01, inside the /etc/mail/spamassassin/local.cf, and I have removed it and restart mail and spamd services.
I also noticed like 3 days ago, Mail Deliverability advised me to add DKIM record for xxx.domain-name.com (I only had one for domain-name.com) , so I added it. Now I have 2 DKIM records, one for xxx.domain-name.com and another for domain-name.com. I used DMARCAnalyzer to test and both entries are valid.

Any idea what's happened? where should I start looking?


Thanks in advance,

 

[muneeb852]

Use Mail Tester and try sending mail to them. They will give you all the insights on what is wrong. Share the results here. If it's SPF, DKIM, rDNS issue they will clearly point it out and give you score based on it.

 

[gix0970]

Thanks for your response. I sent a test email and returned 9/10, the only -1 is the message not sign with dkim. It worked few days ago. But now all emails sent out of the server with dkim=none.

Received: by mail-tester.com (Postfix, from userid 500)
id 1314AA8A83; Sun, 25 Jul 2021 13:52:45 +0200 (CEST)
X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.2 (2018-09-13) on mail-tester.com
X-Spam-Level:
X-Spam-Status: No/0.0/5.0
X-Spam-Test-Scores: SPF_HELO_NONE=0.001,SPF_PASS=-0.001
X-Spam-Last-External-IP: x.x.x.x
X-Spam-Last-External-HELO: hostname.domain-name.com
X-Spam-Last-External-rDNS: hostname.domain-name.com
X-Spam-Date-of-Scan: Sun, 25 Jul 2021 13:52:45 +0200
X-Spam-Report:
* -0.0 SPF_PASS SPF: sender matches SPF record
* 0.0 SPF_HELO_NONE SPF: HELO does not publish an SPF Record
Received-SPF: Pass (sender SPF authorized) identity=mailfrom; client-ip=x.x.x.x; helo=hostname.domain-name.com; envelope-from=[email protected]; receiver=[email protected]-tester.com
DMARC-Filter: OpenDMARC Filter v1.3.1 mail-tester.com 45455A62DF
Authentication-Results: mail-tester.com; dmarc=none header.from=domain-name.com
Received: from hostname.domain-name.com (hostname.domain-name.com [x.x.x.x])
(using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 (256/256 bits))
(No client certificate requested)
by mail-tester.com (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 45455A62DF
for <[email protected]-tester.com>; Sun, 25 Jul 2021 13:52:40 +0200 (CEST)
Received: from [y.y.y.y] (port=57706 helo=DELLSB21FEB)
by hostname.domain-name.com with esmtpsa (TLS1.2) tls TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_256_GCM_SHA384
(Exim 4.94.2)
(envelope-from <[email protected]>)
id 1m7cgO-00029K-Qj
for [email protected]-tester.com; Sun, 25 Jul 2021 19:52:37 +0800
Reply-To: <[email protected]>
From: "user name" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]-tester.com>
Subject: FW: Cron <root@host> (/usr/local/cpanel/scripts/fix-cpanel-perl; /etc/upcp_control >)
Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2021 19:52:34 +0800
Organization: Company Name
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain;
charset="utf-8"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook 15.0
Thread-Index: AdeBS44jcAHOtquRT6+kMaFFiaL2Gg==
Content-Language: en-us
X-AntiAbuse: This header was added to track abuse, please include it with any abuse report
X-AntiAbuse: Primary Hostname - hostname.domain-name.com
X-AntiAbuse: Original Domain - srv1.mail-tester.com
X-AntiAbuse: Originator/Caller UID/GID - [47 12] / [47 12]
X-AntiAbuse: Sender Address Domain - domain-name.com
X-Get-Message-Sender-Via: hostname.domain-name.com: authenticated_id: [email protected]
X-Authenticated-Sender: hostname.domain-name.com: [email protected]
X-Source:
X-Source-Args:
X-Source-Dir:

 

[muneeb852]

DNS Functions > DNS Zone Manager
Click Manage for the domain you are sending mail from. Confirm if the default._domainkey.yourdomain.tld. exists




If it does not exists then this simply means that mail-tester is giving you correct information.

 

[gix0970]

yes its' there

 

[muneeb852]

Visit Dmarc Analyzer and put default at first box and your domain at second reCAPTCHA and try to validate DNS.



box. fill

 

[gix0970]

dkim passed the check at both dmarcanalyzer and mrtoolbox

 

[gix0970]

Email Deliverability Error

 

[muneeb852]

Hmm, this is peculiar. I think there is something wrong with your Exim. Maybe, you need to reset Exim settings.
cPanel official support will be able to help you on this.

If you want to reset Exim settings then Service Configuration > Exim Configuration Manager


Select the 3rd Option in dropdown list. Click reset then.
Please note that if you have done some custom configuration to Exim then create an Exim backup first.

 

[quietFinn]

The system uses an alternate HELO of “xxx.domain-name.com” when sending mail from the “domain-name.com” domain.
The system sends the domain “xxx.domain-name.com” in the SMTP handshake for this domain’s email. “xxx.domain-name.com” does not resolve to any IP addresses.

To fix this problem, contact your system administrator and request that they create a DNS “A” record for “xxx.domain-name.com” whose value is “x.x.x.x”.

This error message tells exactly what is the problem, and how to fix it.
problem:
“xxx.domain-name.com” does not resolve to any IP addresses
what you should do is:
create a DNS “A” record for “xxx.domain-name.com” whose value is “x.x.x.x”

 

[gix0970]

This error message tells exactly what is the problem, and how to fix it.
problem:
“xxx.domain-name.com” does not resolve to any IP addresses
what you should do is:
create a DNS “A” record for “xxx.domain-name.com” whose value is “x.x.x.x”

Thanks quietFinn, apparently isn't that straight forward. Everything works as expected, except dkim is not signed. I suspect something else breaks it.

 

[cPRex]

Can you run this command on the system to see if there really are any alternate helo options configured?

cat /etc/mailhelo

 

[gix0970]

Can you run this command on the system to see if there really are any alternate helo options configured?

cat /etc/mailhelo

yes, the alternate mailhelo is the same as hostname xxx.domain-name.com

 

[cPRex]

If the alternate is the same as the main hostname, it's not really functioning as an alternate. Could you remove that entry to see if that changes the behavior?

 

[gix0970]

Let me find one day to try it out, thanks.

 

[gix0970]

Update: Well, this is really absurd. Disabling Mailman solved the problem. Now everything is working fine, SPF, DKIM, and Mail Deliverability Test.
All along I disabled mailman, but just few days before the issue occurred, I enabled it for some reason. Is this a bug? Any thought?

 

[cPRex]

That definitely seems odd - I wouldn't expect Mailman to have any effect on the mail deliverability tests we perform. I also wasn't able to reproduce that on a test machine. If you have a server where you can reproduce the issue, you could always submit a ticket to our team so we can do some additional investigation.