On Wed, Mar 5, 2014 at 3:23 PM, J. Gomez <[email protected]> wrote:

> We probably inhabit different universes. In mine, SPF -all "just works"
> and, most importantly, it allows the receiver to outsource onto the sender
> 100% of the blame arising from any non-deliveries because of SPF -all
> failures; also, in my universe DMARC has not "succeeded" -- not yet, at
> least.
>

Based on my experience, you do indeed live in a different universe.  I have
no first hand exposure to any installation that respects SPF "-all" above
all others.  Quite literally every place I have ever worked or otherwise
had an inbox has used SPF's result as part of a larger message evaluation
system because false negatives and spoofs are too much of a concern.

I fully understand that there exist places where acting on an SPF failure
with "-all" by rejecting the message "just works".  I am not saying they
don't exist.  I am saying that they appear not to be common.

For DMARC to be a viable option for receivers, it has to provide them with
> a non-refutable answer/position for the cases when mail is not delivered
> because of DMARC failures. If receivers are expected to build a custom,
> fine-tuned, on-going maintenance-heavy local-only system to deal with DMARC
> failure cases, because receivers cannot just outsource onto senders the
> blame for DMARC failure cases, then most receivers WILL NOT IMPLEMENT
> DMARC. My guess is many receivers will not implement DMARC after having
> burned to much time and support costs dealing with DMARC failure cases.
>

Your shouted prediction here is countered by fact, at least in terms of
number of mailboxes covered and ample anecdotal evidence.

As has been repeatedly stated, DMARC is not for everyone.  If it doesn't
handle your use case or the exception handling you will need for your
installation is too expensive, then don't use it.

On the other hand, the Internet is a fertile ground for innovation, so
perhaps there's room for someone to devise a system whereby the exceptions
can be shared among interested parties so that they can spread the costs of
identifying and handling them.

For the sake of encouraging this thread to actually be constructive, I
invite you to propose any text changes that you believe will actually
compel receivers to honor the DMARC result irrespective of other concerns.
If you can succeed where all others before you have failed, I can guarantee
you'll have a new fan club.


> One party's policy published for the consumption of the receivers, is a
> policy expected to be treated as policy by the receivers, otherwise it
> would be the first party's private-policy and not the first party's
> published-policy. If what I publish as policy is to be regarded as a song,
> then why do I bother publishing a policy instead of a song?
>

What gives you, as a sender, domain over how receivers will behave?  Those
are their resources and their users, not yours.  They are the ones that get
the support calls when your actions (or inactions) cause some kind of
negative user experience.  They incur the costs of your actions (or
inactions).  Expecting them to simply do what you command is ridiculous,
and they deserve what they get if they do so.


> > This is not a contradiction, nor is it ex post
> > facto twisting; this is the plain English meaning of the word.
>
> Policy is policy. That someone opts to not follow it, makes it an ignored
> policy, not a non-policy. Therefore, DMARC's policy of p=reject is best to
> be ignored. Or, in other words, there is not such a thing as a workable
> policy of REJECT in DMARC.
>

This is still flatly incorrect.  Simply repeating it doesn't make it true.

I asked you before if the "P" in "SPF" (which stands for "policy", I would
remind you) causes you similar friction.  Does it?  Do you have another
word you'd like to see in its place, at least in the DMARC documents?

More generally, do you have alternative text to propose for the current
DMARC base draft that talks about the "policy" as, effectively, a request
to receivers?  The base draft does go to some length to explain this
already.

More generally still, I would really love to see some constructive feedback
here.  Otherwise, I believe this reduces to little more than skeptical
ranting, and we should move forward.

-MSK
_______________________________________________
dmarc-discuss mailing list
[email protected]
http://www.dmarc.org/mailman/listinfo/dmarc-discuss

NOTE: Participating in this list means you agree to the DMARC Note Well terms 
(http://www.dmarc.org/note_well.html)

Reply via email to