Dear goober.com users,

You're getting this because you have an account on goober.com, or you have
another domain whose email is handled by the same server which hosts
goober.com. If you do not use this server for your email, or if you use it but
only to have email forwarded to another account, then you can ignore this
message.

For those of you who use goober.com as a primary mail server (for incoming and
outgoing messages), our IT administrators have upgraded Sendmail to enable
authentication and SSL for your outbound mail. Your incoming (IMAP) mail is
unaffected.

Reason: Up to now, the administrators have been maintaining a file with a list
of your IP addresses (or ranges, if you have dynamic IPs) and allowing all IPs
in that list to send ("relay") mail through goober.com. However, this is
awkward for those of you who move around on different networks (school vs.
office vs. home vs. traveling etc.) and it is also awkward for us to have to
modify that file and restart the server every time someone's source IP changes.
In addition, every added range of IPs increases the risk of goober.com being
used as a spam relay; e.g., if a spammer also has an IP within the range
configured for you, then the spammer can send untraceable and potentially
malicious email through the goober mailserver. Being such an "open relay" is
bad netiquette and puts us at risk of having goober.com added to RTBLs
(Real-Time Black Lists) maintained by other ISPs and system administrators who
block all traffic from domains known to be open relays. In short, doing things
this way is a Bad Idea.  

So, the way it works now is, you will need to modify your email program's SMTP
(or "Sending," or "Outbound") mail server settings in order to _send_ mail
through goober. (You will still be able to _receive_ goober mail regardless of
whether you make this change or not.) The port number is still 25. Look for a
checkbox in the SMTP settings dialog that says something like "Use password
authentication" and select it. If there are multiple authentication options
available (may say things like "Kerberos" or "MD5"), then select "password" or
"plain/login" or similar. There ought to be fields nearby for your username and
password (same as the ones you use now for logging in to check incoming mail),
as well as an option to save/remember login and pass, so you don't have to
retype them every time you send email.

After you have made and applied/saved these changes, send yourself an email. If
you get an error message, try re-entering your password, make sure the case is
correct in your username, make sure the program didn't change the port to
something other than 25, check the authentication options, and re-do the test.
If you still have problems, revert to the old settings (no authentication) and
then send our support staff (support@goober.com) a note about the error you
got.

We will maintain the old IP list until all users have tested their
configuration with these new settings. If support doesn't hear from you within
a week or so, we will assume you tried it and it works, and your IPs will be
removed from the relay list. At that point, you _must_ use authentication to
send emails through goober.com. 

This server configuration creates an advantage for you, as you can now use
goober.com for your outbound emails from anywhere on the Internet as long as
you authenticate first. We hope that you will enjoy the convenience afforded by
this as you travel, use multiple ISPs, etc. 

Most mail programs also have an option for SMTP SSL (encryption), which
goober.com's sendmail server now supports as well. If your mail program has it,
you should use it -- it encrypts your SMTP login information as well as the
content of the emails you write, between your computer and goober.com, such
that local users on your network cannot run a traffic sniffer and read your
outgoing emails. (Your incoming email is still plain-text, but we plan to
enable SSL on that "half" of the email server as well, just not yet.) The first
time you send email after enabling SSL, you may get a message about the SSL
certificate being untrusted (or "self-signed") -- this is normal and it's okay.
Choose to accept it anyway. If your mail program refuses the certificate
completely, please email support and tell us what it said and what version of
the email software you're using, and turn off SSL in the meantime. You don't
need encryption in order to make email work, it's just nice to have whenever
possible.

Please let support know if you have any problems or questions.

Thank you,

-- Goober Admin