Emails not being sent and Non deliverable messages received

[moramutd]

Hi,

I stopped being a TalkTalk Broadband/Landline customer recently but pay £5pm to retain 4 TalkTalk email address under TalkTalk Mail plus. Whilst I still receive emails to these Accounts, I am now unable to send emails from either Outlook or Thunderbird on my PC or direct from my TalkTalk webmail Accounts. All of the Outlook etc. email settings e.g. passwords etc. are accurate with the webmail Account server settings. When I send an email, I either receive the error message “The server rejected one of the recipients addresses” or “too many recipients”. I have also had “Server Error “453 4.1.1 Dndxra6jB25FY Too Many Recipients (TT502)”. But I previously regularly sent emails to 20 plus addresses without a problem!

I suspect the problem is entirely due to an issue with my email Accounts and the TalkTalk mail server. I tried contacting TalkTalk via Chat but was left waiting to consult a “techy” for almost an hour so tried to speak with someone. When I eventually got through, I was simply told this is a problem affecting many users which should be resolved this evening. I know other TalkTalk customers who are not experiencing the same problem.

I urgently require to send emails to single and multiple addresses and need this problem to be fixed soonest.

Any ideas how this can be resolved would be welcomed

[Gondola]

Hi moramutd 

Happy New Year

Good to know that everything has started well.  One send per hour to the group will be ok so long as all 34 recipients are accepting the mail messages. Fingers crossed.

[moramutd]

Hi Gondola and Ady,

Firstly, Happy New Year to you both.

Following my email problems pre Christmas I did a further scan of my pc with a different virus etc. software, I turned off the router over night and now have a different IP address, I did not send any emails from my pc for over a week and finally changed the Passwords for all of my TalkTalk email addresses. So far, whilst I have not yet sent an email to the 34+ people in my interest group, I am happy to say that touch wood) I have not experienced any further problems sending emails to small number recipients.

I hope that this continues but should further problems arise I hope that I may contact you again on this forum for help.

Thanks again for you assistance.

Cheers,

moramutd

[Gondola]

OK, interested to know what you find.

Using a mobile browser the TalkTalk Mail Settings (cog icon) is via the triple line icon top right.

Select Security and then Your devices.

[moramutd]

Thanks Gondola,

Whilst I have conducted a Norton Virus scan without any threats being identified I have disconnected my computer from the router and will not use the Internet for several days just in case there is unknown malware on it which, unbeknown to me, is generating the volume of emails via my TalkTalk account.

I shall do what you advise over the weekend from this mobile device. Enjoy Christmas and will no doubt return to this discussion afterwards.

regards,

moramutd

[Gondola]

If the email admins can see that your mailbox is intensively used then that would account for the TT501 and TT502 temporary stops on sending.

The TT605 could indicate a sign in from an overseas network.

You can check for unauthorized sign ins.

Sign in to webmail.

Select here:  Sign in to TalkTalk Mail

Enter your full TalkTalk Mail email address, select Continue and enter the password, select Sign in.

Select the cog icon top right and the All settings menu item. (Desktop browser)

Select Security from the left side of the modal that opens.

You can see current and previous sign ins. Anything there that's not one of your sign ins?

Select Sign out from all devices.

[moramutd]

Hi Gondola/Ady,

No, not to my knowledge.

For my clarification: do I assume from Andy’s comment “If we're seeing the mails being sent then they are so someone/something is sending them” mean that TalkTalk can see that load of emails are being sent from my Account which are NOT from me personally and that’s the reason for all The error codes?

Cheers,

moramutd

[Gondola]

Hi @moramutd 

It's a scam phishing email.  Best to report it to TalkTalk - Phishing emails - everything you need to know

Just wondering if you had responded to any previous phishing email without realising and that's how your mailbox password has been discovered?

[moramutd]

Hi Ady,

Thanks for the advice. As I said I ran a full Norton scan yesterday and "No Threats were Found".  I will check to see if that includes a malware scan and if not do so. 

I have this afternoon received, allegedly from TalkTalk, the email below. I am sceptical because the email comes from this non TalkTalk address:

"TalkTalk Customer Service <talktalkserviceteamnotice098765487654987654234567@outlook.com>"

Is this a scam/phishing mail and not legitimately from TalkTalk?

Have a good weekend and Christmas.

Thank you

moramutd

"Hi, We recently sent you an email to update your TalkTalk Mail but you ignored it. Just to let you know that your TalkTalk Mail account will be blocked from sending/ receiving emails and PDF if your account is not updated within 48 hours of receiving this email  Please use the link below to update your TalkTalk Mail CLICK TO UPDATE NOW Thanks for taking the time to update your email. Thank you for being a TalkTalk Customer   The TalkTalk Team"

[Ady-TalkTalk]

First job would be to run a good paid for virus checker on all your internet connected devices and a malware scanner too if not included. If we're seeing the mails being sent then they are so someone/something is sending them. If you can reset the passwords do it but run the scan first. 

Ady

[moramutd]

Hi Andy,

Thanks to you and your colleagues,

just to reiterate, I do not send a lot of emails daily.

I have changed passwords for the 4 Email Accounts previously and could do so again. But why is a password do you say a re-set is not possible now? Do I not just do that via the email Accounts in Webmail? 
It seems I am now also having similar issues a gmail email address that I set up when the TalkTalk problem started.Is it all connected.

thanks again,

moramutd

[Ady-TalkTalk]

Hi moramutd, my colleagues in the email admin team have suggested that you may have been hacked due to the amount of mail and mail recipients going out from your mailbox.  They suggested a password reset, but at the moment that's obviously not possible. 

Ady

[moramutd]

Ady,

Sorry to bother again but also got the error below  when sending test message to TalkTalk. Is TalkTalk blocking my send email addresses because it thinks I'm sending SPAM, which I'm not, but if so how can that be fixed?

The following recipient(s) cannot be reached:

      'test-mail@talktalk.net' on 21/12/2023 15:44

            Server error: '453 4.1.1 GLDdrsgpiSSTw Too Many Recipients (TT502)'

[moramutd]

Hi Ady/Gondola,

I did a full scan with Norton and "No Threats were Found". No VPN is utilised on my PC.

After not using it since Sunday I have just attempted to send an email from my main TalkTalk address to about 34 recipients and received the following "Server error: '453 4.1.1 GJs4rtqno25FY Too Many Recipients (TT501)'" again. I understood such limitation would automatically be resolved after a period of inactivity! What next?

Cheers,

moramutd

[Gondola]

That's not so good then because the TT992 spam / suspicious content rejection suggests that the content is suspicious either because it is or because your email address has been flagged up as sending spam / suspicious content or because you are sending via a VPN host server that's flagged up as sending spam / suspicious content. 

Take the safe approach.

• Scan all your email devices for virus, trojan or other malware
• Disable any VPN service
  Check if your Internet Security software is using a VPN and disable

[moramutd]

Hi Ady,

I turned router off for 40 minutes and when turned back on the same IP address was allocated. However, whilst it was turned off I connected to the Internet via 4g and my sons iPhone and therefore a totally different IP address.  Fom iCloud mail I sent to my wife's TalkTalk email address  2 messages both of which were NOT delivered and I received  the "host mx.talktalk.net[62.24.202.42] said: 552 5.2.0 G06GrdzbMBhgzG06HrQ9fu Content rejected (TT992) (in reply to end of DATA command)" error code.

I then sent the same message to my wife from my gmail address which WAS delivered.  So problem appears not to be an IP address issue. Totally confusing.

I will turn off the router overnight as you suggest to see if a different IP address is allocated but that does not appear to be the problem!

Grateful for your further assistance and advice.

Cheers,

moramutd

[moramutd]

Hi Ady,

Thanks for all that information.

Having looked just now I see that I have an IPv4 address. 

Unlike yourself, I am not an IT specialist would the TT992 error be the route and sole cause of the generation of the other TT501 and TT 502 error codes that arose when sending emails from all of the 4 TalkTalk email accounts and also the gmail and iCloud addresses I have had to establish since the problem started?  

I will do as you suggest regarding switching off my router to and see if a new IP address is allocated and see if so see if the sending problem from all email accounts is resolved. I will let you know the result when I can which may not be until later in the week as I am unavailable for most of tomorrow.

Thanks again.

Cheers,

moramutd

[Gondola]

Now we have a root cause identified. The TT992 error is a permanent fail because your public IP address or email address has been detected as sending spam or other suspicious content. So, you now have positive confirmation on the reason for rate limiting being applied by the spam protection processes.

The usual reason for being tripped up by this issue is because a previous user of the IP address was a spammer.  Your current broadband service has recently inherited the use of that public IP address via dynamic allocation of the IP address to your broadband service by your Internet Service Provider (ISP). I'm assuming here that your ISP has not allocated a permanent or static IP address.

The way to get around this issue is to try and get a new IP address dynamically allocated by your ISP. Check the public IP address then switch off your broadband router for 30 minutes before repowering and rechecking to see if a new public IP address has been allocated. Sometimes you may need to switch off the router overnight.

If you can see that a new public IP address has been allocated then retry the mail sending.

[moramutd]

Hi Ady, Apologies for the delay in responding. No the TT605 error was not specifically to my wife's TalkTalk address. When sending to my wife's address and indeed a friends TalkTalk address I receive the error message:

"host mx.talktalk.net[62.24.202.42] said: 552 5.2.0
FsIxrTsr8jKRnFsIxrbaBT Content rejected (TT992) (in reply to end of DATA
command)"

All very confusing!

[Ady-TalkTalk]

I'm referring to the TT605 error you said you received when you tried to send 1 email to 1 recipient is that this email address or your wife's?

Ady

[moramutd]

Morning Ady,

Thanks. The problem appears to be intermittent and ongoing and was to my wife's email address with the female Christian name that I have already identified in my community profile. The issue meant that she did NOT receive an important email yesterday afternoon from the NHS and a message that I sent her from my iCloud account yesterday and this morning. 

moramutd