My @mac.com emails go to recipients junk folders intermittently. They have marked them as Not Junk and made sure my email was in their address books. This happens with multiple platforms. Any ideas about what's happening and how to fix this?
iMac 27", macOS 10.14
Glassespad wrote:
My @mac.com emails go to recipients junk folders intermittently. They have marked them as Not Junk and made sure my email was in their address books. This happens with multiple platforms. Any ideas about what's happening and how to fix this?
*If you use a non-iCloud SMTP server, don't use your iCloud email address as a "Send From" address. Otherwise, your email
might not deliver or it might deliver to the Junk folder.
ref: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203528
Using your @icloud.com email address - Apple Support
Mail server settings for iCloud email clients - Apple Support
Glassespad wrote:
My @mac.com emails go to recipients junk folders intermittently. They have marked them as Not Junk and made sure my email was in their address books. This happens with multiple platforms. Any ideas about what's happening and how to fix this?
*If you use a non-iCloud SMTP server, don't use your iCloud email address as a "Send From" address. Otherwise, your email
might not deliver or it might deliver to the Junk folder.
ref: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203528
Using your @icloud.com email address - Apple Support
Mail server settings for iCloud email clients - Apple Support
First read the "Does iCloud Mail support DMARC?" section on:
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204137
This is Apple's DMARC policy:
v=DMARC1; p=quarantine; rua=mailto:d@rua.agari.com; ruf=mailto:d@ruf.agari.com;
p=quarantine means to put the message in the Junkmail folder if there are ANY problems. It looks like the recipient server is diligently following the DMARC policy from mac.com. In short, your messages are SUPPOSED TO GO INTO THE JUNKMAIL FOLDER.
Problems with Mac.com's outgoing records
SPF
Mac.com does not have an IPv6 block listed in it's SPF record. Unless iCloud.com is restricting SMTP to IPv4 only, recipients like Gmail is going to accept IPv6 connections, then fail the SPF authentication. Also Apple is designating small blocks which is not recommended for SPF.
DKIM
Apple does not publish DKIM records via DNS, so we can only check by looking at the headers of the messages that did make it in to the recipients Junkmail box.
Diagnosis
View the source of one of the mac.com messages in the recipient's junkmail box and look for the SPF= and DKIM= entry in the header section. If they're anything other than pass, then the recipient server is following the DKIM policy correctly.
SPF, DKIM, and DMARC authentication all have to work together for very strict mail services like Gmail to accept messages. Without them, any spam-like behavior will send a red flag. Any message with a URL, multiple recipients, including an image; will be designated as spam.
Because of different mail providers having drastically different security policies, sending mail fails. At least this way, the recipient receives the message (straight to junk).
Thanks, I've done that a bit but have so many correspondents with my .mac account that I haven't even gone on to .me or .icloud. It looks like it was a SMTP issue with that email. It's fine now as far as I can tell.
This seems to refer to bulk mail senders which is not the case. It also doesn't explain why my emails sometimes go through. I'm still perplexed and unsure how to proceed.
Thank you. That seems to have solved the problem at least with some correspondents.
That’s a practical work-around.
You can also just get a Gmail or Outlook account and abandon your Mac.com account.
My @mac.com emails go to recipients junk folders intermittently.