The sad thing is that there is no need to do a bandage pull if evaluators
can learn how to serve the interests of their users properly.   I don't
throw away any mail based on Sender Authentication failure alone.   But I
also don't tolerate the idea that I have to accept malicious impersonation
in order to accept all of the mail that my users should receive.

In this group, I have been arguing a losing cause that DMARC authentication
can wisely be applied whether a DMARC policy exists or not.   After
discarding blacklisted message sources, here are my results from applying
DMARC-like rules to all of my mail:

61% are aligned with both SPF PASS and DKIM PASS
16% are aligned with SPF only
16% are aligned with DKIM only
----
93% aligned with DMARC-like logic
  4% are authenticated using local policy that allows non-standard
alignment or overrides a non-PASS SPF result.
----
97% of all FROM address are verified to my satisfaction

Clearly, I am within reach of 100% verification of the RFC5322.From domain.

I don't know that I receive any mailing list traffic, but this is how it
would fit into my model:
- Failure to verify causes the message to be flagged for review.
- Review indicates that the message is from a mailing list
- Research determines that the MLM provides reliable Sender Authentication
and best effort spam filtering, so I do not need to repeat sender
authentication
- I create a local policy that accepts any From domain when the SMTP and
Server information identify the mailing list.
- Mailing list messages are forwarded to content filtering for normal
acceptance processing.

So my "stream info" proposal is trying to solve the "research" entry on the
list above.

If the mailing list cannot be trusted to perform Sender Authentication,
then I need to implement code which parses the entire set of Received
headers, ARC headers, and possibly other headers.  I am probably not
willing put that processing burden on every message to solve a problem for
a poorly-managed list    I will be easier to refuse the accommodation and
tell the user to join the list with a Google account.

So I think we need a document that tells evaluators how to "not be
stupid".    I may be the only one present who can write it, and I could do
so if the scope is willing to move in that direction.

But as long as there are stupid evaluators, senders have to cope with the
reality in front of them.

Doug Foster



On Wed, Apr 5, 2023 at 4:14 AM Neil Anuskiewicz <n...@marmot-tech.com>
wrote:

> I’m with Doug on this one. The bandage should be pulled off quickly and
> sympathy expressed to those who miss backward compatibility. I wouldn’t say
> utilitarianism is the right frame but here why wouldn’t it be morally right
> not to mention technically sound to inconvenience and anger the few to
> create positive downstream effects for the majority.
>
> If mailing list managers were also flogged then my opinion would shift
> right back in favor of the manager. Regardless, I feel gratitude for the
> work of ml managers but I’m sorry maybe the day has come to discuss making
> decisions for the community as a whole even if it inconveniences (granted
> not trivially).
>
> I had trouble sleeping so I hope my response holds up as being reasonable
> when I re read it in the morning. Thanks.
>
> Neil
>
> On Mar 29, 2023, at 7:01 PM, Douglas Foster <
> dougfoster.emailstanda...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> 
> If my cigarette smoke inconveniences 100 people on my plane flight, should
> I come prepared to go smokeless or should they come prepared with masks?
> The mailing list problem is created by mailing list practices, and it is
> the mailing lists problem to solve the problem they created.
>
> We actually have an abundance of options for them right now:
>
>    - Do not alter content.
>    - Mung the From address
>    - Use ARC to indicate that the list is forwarding and modifying
>    traffic from someone else.
>    - As part of the subscription process, require subscribers to get a
>    filtering exception implemented for the list traffic.
>    - Use test messages to determine whether a recipient domain blocks on
>    p=reject, and do conditional munging for only those recipient domains that
>    need it.
>
> In the case of this IETF list, probably zero participants need From
> munging, but IETF mungs everything from Comcast because they are unwilling
> to attempt conditional munging.   So Comcast should allow its domain to be
> impersonated so that IETF does not have to collect and use
> subscriber-specific information?
>
> For any mailing list trust system to work, the mailing list would have to
> be trustworthy.    Most mailing lists should be able to require 100% SPF
> PASS on posts, as well as exact match between MailFrom domain and From
> domain, because posts should be individual contributions.   However, the
> testimony of knowledgeable people in this group is that most mailing lists
> cannot be bothered to enforce sender authentication at all.    These lists
> aren't protecting their subscribers from impersonation fraud, yet they are
> complaining that evaluators are suspecting them of forwarding impersonation
> fraud.  That is hypocrisy.
>
> Someone please explain to me why everyone should make themselves more
> vulnerable to ransomware and other attacks so that mailing lists can avoid
> being inconvenienced and avoid having secure operating practices.
>
> Doug Foster
>
>
>
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 29, 2023 at 7:56 PM Barry Leiba <barryle...@computer.org>
> wrote:
>
>> 1. IETF has installed a very ugly workaround to the problem, rewriting
>> the "from" header field.  It's absolutely a workaround, and not a proper
>> solution.
>>
>> 2. Without the workaround, the real pain is not that a message from
>> Comcast posted to the list doesn't get to you (though that's true): the
>> real pain is that if Valimail rejects (bounces) those messages, the Mailman
>> software will eventually unsubscribe you -- YOU, not the Comcast user --
>> from the list for exceeding the bounce threshold.
>>
>> 3. Even with the workaround, I see, as a list owner, several unsubscribe
>> notifications a week due to excessive bounces.
>>
>> The damage to mail list operations is real, and expecting every mailing
>> list manager to install an ugly workaround is not the right answer.
>> Telling those deploying DMARC what interoperability problems an
>> inappropriate choice of p=reject causes, and telling them not to do that...
>> is the right answer.
>>
>> And, as I said, when they decide that their needs are more important than
>> those interoperability problems, they have that right, and at least they
>> will now be making an informed decision.  The standard needs to say this.
>>
>> Barry
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Mar 30, 2023 at 6:41 AM Todd Herr <todd.herr=
>> 40valimail....@dmarc.ietf.org> wrote:
>>
>>> Colleagues,
>>>
>>> Can someone please point me to a mailing list server or other indirect
>>> mail flow that I might somehow engage with so that I can experience the
>>> pain of not having a message reach its destination when sent with a policy
>>> of p=reject?
>>>
>>> I post to various IETF mailing lists from my work address, and my
>>> employer, like Mr. Brotman's, publishes a DMARC record with p=reject.
>>> Thanks to the work of the folks who manage the IETF mailing list software,
>>> my participation in these discussions is not hindered in any way; I can
>>> post to lists, people can reply directly to me if they choose, and I can
>>> reply to the list and/or to the author of any post without any extra work
>>> on my part.
>>>
>>> This leaves me in a position where I do not appreciate how a DMARC
>>> policy of p=reject can harm interoperability, or perhaps better stated, I
>>> do not appreciate that it does harm interoperability. I understand that it
>>> can, because SPF can fail when mail transits intermediaries and DKIM can
>>> fail if the intermediary alters the content of the message. That said, I
>>> cannot recall seeing a bounce attributable to a DMARC failure in the three
>>> years that I've worked here (nor for the year or two prior when my previous
>>> employer deployed p=reject) and so I want to be able to send a message that
>>> would result in such a bounce.
>>>
>>> Can anyone help me?
>>>
>>> Thanks.
>>>
>>> --
>>>
>>> *Todd Herr * | Technical Director, Standards and Ecosystem
>>> *e:* todd.h...@valimail.com
>>> *m:* 703.220.4153
>>>
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