[Fwd: Re: SA Timed Out (Redux)]

[Kevin Spicer]

On Sat, 2003-10-11 at 03:49, Chris Trudeau wrote:

>Using DCC/Razor and RBL checks...any ideas on how to determine if these
>are timing out?  Its weird that in batches of multiple emails...only
>one
>message will result in the timed out message...

If you have any copies of affected messages try running spamassassin -D
<message.txt against it and see where the delays are.  Most probably its
DNS checks (maybe RBLs) causing problems.

>Any ideas about that?  FWIW...I have a MailScanner 4.23/SA 2.55 machine
>right next to it...on the SAME pipe...that is not experiencing these
>problems...identical configurations...

Is one machine a primary and one a secondary MX?  Some spammers
persistently use lower preference MX's.

>P.S.  I would rather messages that timeout...then get re-queued...and
>re-scanned...seems to me that a default timed out resulting in delivery
>would present an avenue for a DOS against SA...SPAMMERS could
>say...hmmm...all we have to do it cause SA to timeout...and everyone
>using it...would DELIVER our messages....hmmmm.....I could be and am
>likely wrong...

If its something that spammers did to a message to get SA to time out
then it would time out every time SA tried to process.  Fine, it doesn't
get delivered - BUT... imagine getting hundreds of these stuck in your
incoming queue.  Then imagine the effect this would have on the delivery
of genuine mail.  Spammers don't give a damn whether they interfere with
your regular mail, and its not a great leap to think that some
enterprising spammer would start deliberately DOSing sites (esp ISP's)
which did the above to encourage them to turn SA off.





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