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Help! My domain has been hijacked by a spammer.

by spearce000
9 replies
I've had difficulty getting emails through to clients and others, and people have told me that my emails end up in their spam folders - especially people who have Gmail or Hotmail accounts. I've proven this to be true by sending a test email to my own Gmail account (it contained nothing spammy, just "testing 1234") yet it ended up in the spam folder. When I checked the "catch all" mailbox on my server, I found lots of "bounced" emails advertising watches and suchlike which had been sent from mailboxes on my domain that don't exist to people I've never heard of. Now Google thinks I'm a spammer and is treating all emails sent from my domain as such.


What can I do?
Has anybody else had this problem? If so, how did you solve it?


Any help and advice would be much appreciated.
#domain #hijacked #spammer
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  • Profile picture of the author Kosmalll
    The fact that bounce messages are pouring into your catch-all from non-existent addresses almost 100% means that you either don't have proper SPF/DKIM/DMARC configured, or they're set up only formally.
    What I would do step by step:
    1) Check SPF - it should clearly specify which servers are allowed to send mail on behalf of your domain. And make sure you use -all, not ~all, if you're confident in your configuration.
    2) Enable DKIM -- sign all outgoing emails.
    3)Set up DMARC with at least a p=quarantine policy, and ideally move gradually to p=reject.
    4) Check your domain in Google Postmaster Tools - you can see your reputation there.
    5) If your IP is "burned," you might want to temporarily switch to a third-party SMTP provider (SendGrid, Mailgun, Amazon SES) while your reputation recovers.
    6) Disable catch-all (or at least reconsider using it) - it often just helps spammers.

    One more thing: if you're hosting email on your own server without proper monitoring, Google and Hotmail can put you in the "gray zone" very quickly. From experience, sometimes it's easier to migrate to a reliable email provider than to fight deliverability issues manually
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    • Profile picture of the author spearce000
      Thanks for that. Google Postmaster Tools shows problems with SPF, DKIM and DMARC on my server. The edit function in Cpanel has been disabled, so I've opened a support ticket with my hosting company and forwarded your advice to them so they can sort it out. Many thanks.
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  • Profile picture of the author Monetize
    Originally Posted by spearce000 View Post

    I've had difficulty getting emails through to clients and others, and people have told me that my emails end up in their spam folders - especially people who have Gmail or Hotmail accounts. I've proven this to be true by sending a test email to my own Gmail account (it contained nothing spammy, just "testing 1234") yet it ended up in the spam folder. When I checked the "catch all" mailbox on my server, I found lots of "bounced" emails advertising watches and suchlike which had been sent from mailboxes on my domain that don't exist to people I've never heard of. Now Google thinks I'm a spammer and is treating all emails sent from my domain as such.


    What can I do?
    Has anybody else had this problem? If so, how did you solve it?


    Any help and advice would be much appreciated.

    I agree with contacting your email service and
    if they do not fix this, I would move the whole
    operation over to someplace more secure.

    This is time-consuming and inconvenient but
    sometimes it needs to be done.
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    Monetization Skool
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  • Profile picture of the author Dangolove
    hi! This is a common problem. I think you need to change your approach, set up mailing tasks, and see if that helps
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  • Profile picture of the author ExRat
    Hi,

    I guess ideally you want to try to establish how the compromise happened and close off that entry point (apologies if you already have).
    Signature


    Roger Davis
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  • Profile picture of the author xavierfok
    contact your registrar right now and file an abuse report.

    check your DNS records to see if anything got changed, and change every single password you have, registrar, hosting, email, all of it. turn on 2FA everywhere.

    once you get control back submit a reconsideration request to Google because any spam content on your domain will wreck your rankings. also make sure your registrar lock is enabled so nobody can transfer the domain out from under you.
    Signature
    Singapore Mobile Proxies 24h Trial
    Guide to setting up proxies for multi accounting
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  • Profile picture of the author Moodesburn1977
    not good whover ure registrar is report to them my first call would be
    Signature

    Lets build a online business by giving value and learning how to build a email list
    https://givevaluefirst.systeme.io/gi...onwarriorforum

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  • Profile picture of the author Dаniel+
    Originally Posted by spearce000 View Post

    I've had difficulty getting emails through to clients and others, and people have told me that my emails end up in their spam folders - especially people who have Gmail or Hotmail accounts. I've proven this to be true by sending a test email to my own Gmail account (it contained nothing spammy, just "testing 1234") yet it ended up in the spam folder. When I checked the "catch all" mailbox on my server, I found lots of "bounced" emails advertising watches and suchlike which had been sent from mailboxes on my domain that don't exist to people I've never heard of. Now Google thinks I'm a spammer and is treating all emails sent from my domain as such.


    What can I do?
    Has anybody else had this problem? If so, how did you solve it?


    Any help and advice would be much appreciated.
    Classic case of someone spoofing your domain to send spam - Google picked up on it and now flags everything from you.
    First thing to do is set up SPF, DKIM and DMARC records if you haven't already. Then check your domain's reputation on Google Postmaster Tools and MXToolbox to see if you're blacklisted. If you are ,you can submit a delist request to Google - it's slow but it works.
    Also consider disabling your catch-all mailbox, it just makes things worse.
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  • Profile picture of the author zanetavakoli
    Same happened with me.
    Clicked on some mail and then it happened. I also searching for solution.
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  • Profile picture of the author realasifn
    Have you tried email marketing on that domain before?
    Have you tried changing the mail server or your web hosting provider?

    My name is Asif and Running a web hosting business called Midway Host for 9 years, we see all kinds of issues like these. I would love to fix your issue for free, reply to this thread or mail me at realasifn@gmail.com
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