[LINK] Question re mail addressing

[Stilgherrian]

On 3/2/07 7:38 AM, "rchirgwin at ozemail.com.au" <rchirgwin at ozemail.com.au>
wrote:
> So the question is: how can the message arrive at my inbox if it doesn't
> have my address in the To: field? A mail server so badly configured that
> it delivers stuff to "nearby" addresses is hard to credit, so I am
> assuming that the spammer is obfuscating the To: field - is that possible?

This is perfectly normal, all part of the a spec for Internet email.

There are two separate points in an email transaction where the address of
the recipient is specified. Yes, there's the "To:" header (or the "Cc:" or
"Bcc:" headers) which are part of the data stream that's the *content* of
the email. The headers section and the rest of the content is separated by a
blank line.

But there's also the "envelope" conversation before that, where the sender
and recipient are specified.

What's happening is that the envelope specifies your friend's address as the
recipient, but then the email content includes headers which say something
else.

I'll leave it to one of the tedious pedants on Link to link to the RFC.


> ( I suspect the ISP's call centre has no idea and is just giving
> whatever answer seems plausible )

Wow, an ISP which doesn't know how email works... how unusual.. ;)

Stil


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