Exim sends mail from apache@hostname instead of the hostname I’m defining

apache-2.2exim

Whenever I send mail via Exim, even if I set a from field, it always says the e-mail is from: apache@server.mydomain.com. Is there any way to make the from field work or at least change the default from address? Thanks.

Best Answer

Okay, looking at the class you've linked to - you should already be setting the From: header which gets you half way there. Chances are that you're seeing the emails coming through look something like this:

From: <senderofchoice@example.com>
Sender: <apache@example.com>
Return-path: <apache@example.com>

Which isn't great. It looks confusing to a lot of people and Outlook users also helpfully see such messages tagged as "Apparently From".

This is caused by Exim not permitting Apache (as a system account) from "spoofing" the From address. You can see in line 39 of that class that sendmail is called (the Sendmail binary is symlinked to Exim for historical reasons) something like so:

sendmail -f $fromEmail

This tells Exim to specify the envelope sender address which is by default restricted to UID 0. You can read the intricate details about this from the -f section of the Exim man page. In short can change this by permitting Apache to modify the envelope sender in exim.conf:

trusted_users = apache

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Exim mail server: When I send test mail to the Gmail, how can I hide the hostname after “via”

Have you followed the steps outlined by Google?

"Gmail checks whether emails are correctly authenticated. If your messages are sent by a bulk mailing vendor or by third-party affiliates, please publish an SPF record (#2) that includes the IPs of the vendor or affiliates which send your messages. Or, you may consider signing your messages with a DKIM (#3) signature that is associated with your domain."

Option 2, is probably the most straight forward which will also yield the most mileage (with other systems/site as well - besides Google)

" 2. SPF record: An SPF record is a list of IP addresses that are authorized to send mail for a particular domain. For more information on how to publish an SPF record, please visit http://www.openspf.org."

How to setup exim to check the From field

After a few exploratory questions, we've concluded that the issue is you need to detect when a message sender is not local and route it differently. So first, I would detect non-local senders by adding to the RCPT acl:

warn  condition = ${if forany{+local_domains}{eq{$item}{$sender_address_domain}}}
      set acl_m_use_ses=1

The forany loops through all domains in the +local_domains list and compares each one to $sender_address_domain. The variable only gets set if the sender domain is in that list. Then in your router, you add the requirement that the variable must be set to 1:

condition = ${if eq{$acl_m_use_ses}{1} {yes}{no}}

Then the outbound message will skip that router if the MAIL FROM envelope sender does not have a domain that is recognized by exim as a local domain. For the emails which skip this router, you must have a subsequent router that will either try to send the email out directly using SMTP or out through a different smarthost that doesn't require the domain to match.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Exim mail server: When I send test mail to the Gmail, how can I hide the hostname after “via”

How to setup exim to check the From field

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