How Do I Remove Myself From A Blacklist?

artman · 18 Oct 2022, 11:30 AM

I am using the current version of Thunderbird. My email address is a gmail.com email.

I have discovered that I am on a blacklist called SORBS. Sometimes my email goes the the SPAM folder of the person receiving my email message and I am told that the incoming mail server may see the blacklist and send my email to the recipient's SPAM folder.

I have no idea how I got on the blacklist as i am not a marketing or email company that sends marketing emails.

Can someone please tell me how a person gets onto a blacklist and how I can be removed.

Thanks very much for your help. Bill

somdcomputerguy · 18 Oct 2022, 01:21 PM

You can see here, it may be useful - (De)Listing Overview.

- Bruce

Bamb0 · 18 Oct 2022, 07:03 PM

They have a pretty nice looking site there

Welcome ashore Artman!!

SideshowBob · 18 Oct 2022, 10:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by artman

My email address is a gmail.com email.

I have discovered that I am on a blacklist called SORBS.

What makes you think that that is why your mail is ending up in spam folders? It sounds unlikely. What exactly is listed?

artman · 18 Oct 2022, 11:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SideshowBob

What makes you think that that is why your mail is ending up in spam folders? It sounds unlikely. What exactly is listed?

I read a couple of Internet articles that said the incoming mail servers, etc. look at an email and determine if the message is on a blacklist. If it is many times the mail server will send the message directly to the Spam folder or sometimes not deliver the message at all.

I found a website called mail-tester.com. You bring up the website and they give an email address to send your email to. After you send the email you click on the test results button and it gives you 10 items that it rates your email message according to if your message is a spam candidate.

When I send my email message to mail-tester.com it is giving me a score of 7.2 out of 10. It is counting a full point off because it says I am on the blacklist called SORBS.

As I said in my post I am not a company (marketing) but an individual person sending an email.

I think the mail-tester.com site is pretty good.

Thanks, SlideshowBob

JeremyNicoll · 19 Oct 2022, 04:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by artman

When I send my email message to mail-tester.com it is giving me a score of 7.2 out of 10. It is counting a full point off because it says I am on the blacklist called SORBS

The link given earlier to details about SORBS shows that they blacklist for a variety of different reasons. I would have thought that recipients of your mails would be able to see - in those mails' headers - the reason that SORBS had not liked your emails.

Does the mail-tester website also show the specific reason for the SORBS blacklist?

Quote:

Originally Posted by artman

As I said in my post I am not a company (marketing) but an individual person sending an email.

That may be so, but is not necessarily very relevant. What possibly matters a lot more is where it is being sent from. The problem might eg be the IP address of your device when it sends the mail to the email server that then sends the mail onwards, or the problem might be the IP address of the server that sends the mail onwards.

In the first case it's likely that the IP address your device has now has been used in the past by someone else, who sent spam. Note that the IP address that the outside world sees as yours might be shared with many other people; if you're on a LAN or a wifi network, it's the IP address of the whole network that represents all of you to the outside world. So if any of the other people using that have sent spam at any point in the past, that whole network's users would see this problem.

In the second case, whether the block gets lifted probably depends on who that server belongs to - if it's a reputable email company then they will probably have had complaints from many of their users and will do something about it (not least finding out which other of their users sent spams that got the server blacklisted)

It would help to know which mail service is sending your mails.

somdcomputerguy · 19 Oct 2022, 05:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JeremyNicoll

It would help to know which mail service is sending your mails.

Quote:

Originally Posted by artman

My email address is a gmail.com email.

I would assume Gmail be the answer.

- Bruce

SideshowBob · 19 Oct 2022, 05:59 AM

I just sent a test message to mail-tester.com from gmail. The gmail outgoing server was listed on SORBS. If you saw the SORBS listing in the bottom part of the mail-tester results, under Blocklists, then that's what happened.

JeremyNicoll · 19 Oct 2022, 07:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by somdcomputerguy

I would assume Gmail be the answer.

- Bruce

I saw what the OP wrote, but did not want to assume something that might not have been the case, which is why I asked.

TenFour · 19 Oct 2022, 07:35 PM

By any chance is the receiving email address managed by a Microsoft service like Exchange or Outlook.com? I have found that Microsoft routinely funnels all sorts of legitimate email into the Junk folder and it is nearly impossible to prevent it. If you use Microsoft for your email be sure to check the Junk folder every day.

TenFour · 20 Oct 2022, 02:26 AM

I just tested a Gmail address at mail-tester and the overall score was a 9/10, but I am listed in a blacklist at SORBS. Unfortunately, many Gmail IPs get listed on SORBS. If you are sending direct from the Gmail web interface or the Gmail app there is probably not much you can do about it. It would be up to Gmail to follow up, which I imagine they have to do regularly with lots of spammers using gmail addresses. However, your message is a bit lower scored on mail-tester. I am only getting 1 point off for SORBS. Is anything else listed to knock off the additional 1.8 points when you run mail-tester?

jarland · 26 Oct 2022, 11:44 PM

Sorbs listings won't cause spam folder delivery anywhere I'm aware of, I would move on to the next idea. Most writers on this topic make a lot of assumptions that they can't verify. It makes studying things like this very difficult, it's a very strange topic in that way.

n5bb · 27 Oct 2022, 03:06 AM

Bill, you say that your have a gmail.com email address but that you are using an email client (Thunderbird) rather than web-based email. I hope you realize that due to DMARC and other authentication features, you must use the gmail SMTP outgoing email server to send from an email client. Without viewing the full headers of the messages arriving in spam folders it’s hard to guess what’s causing your difficulty.

Bill

18 Oct 2022, 11:30 AM	#1
artman Junior Member Join Date: Oct 2022 Location: Lenexa, KS (Kansas City metro) Posts: 14	How Do I Remove Myself From A Blacklist? I am using the current version of Thunderbird. My email address is a gmail.com email. I have discovered that I am on a blacklist called SORBS. Sometimes my email goes the the SPAM folder of the person receiving my email message and I am told that the incoming mail server may see the blacklist and send my email to the recipient's SPAM folder. I have no idea how I got on the blacklist as i am not a marketing or email company that sends marketing emails. Can someone please tell me how a person gets onto a blacklist and how I can be removed. Thanks very much for your help. Bill

18 Oct 2022, 01:21 PM	#2
somdcomputerguy Cornerstone of the Community Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Rupert, WV Posts: 879	You can see here, it may be useful - (De)Listing Overview. - Bruce

18 Oct 2022, 07:03 PM	#3
Bamb0 Master of the @ Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: USA Posts: 1,871	They have a pretty nice looking site there Welcome ashore Artman!!

19 Oct 2022, 05:59 AM	#8
SideshowBob Essential Contributor Join Date: Jan 2017 Posts: 278	I just sent a test message to mail-tester.com from gmail. The gmail outgoing server was listed on SORBS. If you saw the SORBS listing in the bottom part of the mail-tester results, under Blocklists, then that's what happened.

19 Oct 2022, 07:35 PM	#10
TenFour Master of the @ Join Date: Feb 2017 Location: USA Posts: 1,722	By any chance is the receiving email address managed by a Microsoft service like Exchange or Outlook.com? I have found that Microsoft routinely funnels all sorts of legitimate email into the Junk folder and it is nearly impossible to prevent it. If you use Microsoft for your email be sure to check the Junk folder every day.

20 Oct 2022, 02:26 AM	#11
TenFour Master of the @ Join Date: Feb 2017 Location: USA Posts: 1,722	I just tested a Gmail address at mail-tester and the overall score was a 9/10, but I am listed in a blacklist at SORBS. Unfortunately, many Gmail IPs get listed on SORBS. If you are sending direct from the Gmail web interface or the Gmail app there is probably not much you can do about it. It would be up to Gmail to follow up, which I imagine they have to do regularly with lots of spammers using gmail addresses. However, your message is a bit lower scored on mail-tester. I am only getting 1 point off for SORBS. Is anything else listed to knock off the additional 1.8 points when you run mail-tester?

26 Oct 2022, 11:44 PM	#12
jarland Essential Contributor Join Date: Apr 2014 Posts: 399 Representative of: MXRoute.com	Sorbs listings won't cause spam folder delivery anywhere I'm aware of, I would move on to the next idea. Most writers on this topic make a lot of assumptions that they can't verify. It makes studying things like this very difficult, it's a very strange topic in that way.

27 Oct 2022, 03:06 AM	#13
n5bb Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: May 2004 Location: Irving, Texas Posts: 8,926	Bill, you say that your have a gmail.com email address but that you are using an email client (Thunderbird) rather than web-based email. I hope you realize that due to DMARC and other authentication features, you must use the gmail SMTP outgoing email server to send from an email client. Without viewing the full headers of the messages arriving in spam folders it’s hard to guess what’s causing your difficulty. Bill