# Bigfoot.com email forwarding not working - please Help



## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Dear Techguys,

I hope this is the right forum for this post, please forgive me if not for I could not find a more appropriate one when I looked just now.

My problem is I use bigfoot.com as a forwarding email service - it has been brilliant for years and protected my real email address and made it so easy to transfer isp with no loss of emails and so forth.

The bad news though.....

Now, for the past week my email has not been arriving!

I've looked on the web and there seems to be a problem with bigfoot but I can't be sure.

Here is a link with frustration of a few others:

http://www.beta.bt.com/bta/forums/thread.jspa?messageID=34367

It's a UK forum but the problem seems to be widespread.

I don't know if my emails are being bounced [I tried to email myself but get nothing back if i sent to my bigfoot email address]

Are the emails lost forever or will they "eventually" arrive.

One of the posts talks about bigfoot upgrading its servers.

I don't know if spammers are causing bigfoot to get blocked on various email servers or what.

This is a real "strain" as the days go by but I can't seem to find a bigfoot user group that is tackling the problem etc.

I CAN NOT just switch to another email supplier service as ther amount I have invested giving contacts at business and others with my lifetime bigfoot address is immense.

Any help guidance appreciated.

I can not get replies from bigfoot help other than an elecrreonic reponse and there seems to be no human I can contact.

I guess I feel totally isolated!

Thanks once again for any help.

Kind regards

Mike


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Hi, same problem Mike only I have received a few mails. Have seen this before and your mail may be lost for ever.

I will post if I find anything out.


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

thanks njtom - at least it seems I am not alone!

the real frustrating thing is bigfoot not coming out and communicating with customers - it would be easier to bear if they had a notice on their web site at least saying "what" was happening etc.

I ve been with them for years - many years - but now I am off, this is the last straw.

Real problem to switch though as over the years I have invested all my contacts using the bigfoot tag!

REALLY worrying what happens to emails too - you make the point they may be lost forever but does anyone have any idea where these things end up - are they chewed up and deleted or can someone intercept them?

All in all quite alarming that its now a week and still not end in sight

thanks again, I too will post with any developments


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Mike,

I am exactly in the same boat, been with them for years. I read through the UK thread and they too are having the same issues. Bigfoot is like the government. I never see them admit anything. I tried to send a support email and it failed because the server was down. I immediately sent again and it went through. I asked them to reply to gmail.

Worse I forgot my damn password since I never log in to them and I am on a business trip and cannot access my home machine to look up the password.

I am with you I am leaving Bigfoot even if it takes me a year. Too many email addresses as it is.

Keep me up in your loop and I will do the same.

Tom


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Tom,

I couldn't help thinking/mulling over about your dilemma being away on a business trip and unable to access the account.

I've come up with something that I have tested, and it works;

Try logging into your account - enter your user name [eg, [email protected]] then enter a password - any password! - bigfoot will tell you it is wrong and then...then it will give you the option of "forgot password?"

If you click that option it will then give you option to have your password forwarded to you.

The good news is despite bigfoot server/email problems that when I tested this just now for you the via the password forgotten option bigfoot forwarded my password to me within seconds!

Hence you CAN access bigfoot right now!

The other things I thought you may want to consider - you could try putting an auto respond on your bigfoot account and in that message you could give receipients another email address to contact you - such as an emergency googlemail account you could set up right now away from home etc. I don't know if it will work in the current situation but at least your conscience will be clear you have done all you can etc and make it easier to bear whilst you are on your trip.

Hope this helps.

Bad news otherwise - no improvement in bigfoot forwarding emails generally and I'm now into day 8 without many emails at all getting through just the odd one.

Hopefully the weekend will bring better news.

Hope the above is of help to you whilst you are away.

Mike


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Thanks for the suggestions. I already have a Gmail account so that part is easy. I tried getting my password mailed since I forgot it and I have yet to get that mail. Without the password I am up the creek etc.

Let's hope they fix this. Actually, to really rub salt in I pay extra for the special handling. So much for paying more.

Hang in there, this has got to improve. 

Tom


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Mike,

More info. I just checked my forwarded account. I sent out a reply from their webmail and sent myself a copy to bigfoot. It came back with a message that the message cannot be delivered. Now I know where our mail is. Back at the senders postoffice.

My ISP email will retry to send for 5 days. I sure hope they all try that long. 

Come Monday its torches and pitch forks up the hill to Bigfoot.

Enjoy your weekend. 

This could be worse, they could be using the USPS.


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi Tom,

I hope you received the bigfoot password ok - I ran the test again a few moments ago and bigfoot emailed it to me again within seconds.

Interested to her you got a "bounce" reply thatt your email couldn't get through to bigfoot - for every time I try that kind of thing nothing happens so as far as people sending me emails is concerned they will have no reason to think I have not received them. I've tried doing this self test from other email accounts with family members using their hotmail accounts or gmail etc and never get the bounce back - so just be aware not all your customers will perhaps know you are not getting their emails.

Its easy I guess for all of us to get upset and blame bigfoot - they have had problems in teh past and always got things moving including sending the backlog eventually - but this time it does "feel" different" - I live in europe and overnight not one single email has got through to me [there have been odd ones each day but nothing like the volume I know I get each day]. Somehow it feels like bigfoot are struggling in a way I've not seen before for no emails sent to them are even being replied to for the lalst 48 hours either - maybe I m now on their blacklist for having emailed progressively over the week whe not getting any replies!

Moving from them though is still fraught with problems for in the heat of hte moment I don't want to undertake such a massive task - and the whole continuity and relationship with others based on bigfoot's lifetime email concept will be shattered.

If only they would come clean, post a bulletin to say we are in a hole but scrambling to get it fixed and up and running again by x - even if x was another 10 days at least I'd know the situation!

I've seen reference on another web site to a telephone number but I dont know its worth or validation -you may want to give it a try but I have and its answerphone as I guess its now the weekend - more frustration; 1 866 300 7155


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Mike,

I also tried a second email to myself from Gmail and no response. 
Unless these guys fell victim to the DNS issue they may have hardware issues. My big problem is that there are a lot of forum comments and Bigfoot does not even post a message. 

I never received the password which is also an issue for me since I cannot post anything using their webmail issue.

Let's see what happens on Monday, you may know before me due to our time difference. Hope they contact you or fix this.

Tom


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## mikerog (Aug 10, 2008)

I want to add my support to this thread. I too have suffered over a week with a few email trickling through, no pattern reconised. Some test emails have got through, some hoave 'expired' and some have been returned with suggestions that i look up bigfoot email servers with blocking sites like OSDL. 

I was encouraged by a response i recieved soon after complianing. A case number was included in the email, but i have sent mail headers to them 4 days ago without reply. 

I too will seriously look to move my 'free' account away from them when this debacle is sorted out. 

Looks like you get even less for free nowadays!!


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Mike and Mike,

I just opened my Gmail mail and received the stock response with a case number. I also finally located my password in an old email from Bigfoot in 2007. I knew there was a reason for saving all that old mail. 
Here is my story and it is a repeat of something that happened over a year ago. Then as now I started to experience no email. When I checked my account they told me that unless I accepted opt in for the free account I could not receive email. Well, I had a premium account as I do now. So I wrote them received a reply and they fixed the problem. Well it looks like they repeated my problem So tomorrow I will try to locate a phone number and try to straighten this out. In the mean time I selected opt in and sent another test message. I am still waiting for that reply. 

I really believe many people worldwide are having this problem. The BT UK thread seems like quite a few users are having this as well. 

Thanks for adding your comments Mikerog, stay in the thread and by next week this should sort out I hope. 

I think I am going to use Google Mail, I have had an account since they were beta and you can forward from them as well.

Regards,

Tom


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## kakalukiajay (Aug 10, 2008)

I have used Bigfoot since about 1996.
Over the past four days some test e-mails have bounced quickly and others go unanswered.
I too wish Bigfoot would announce what is happening.


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi,

Strangely enough, I'm now calming down - I don't know if its that its a Sunday or what I have seen on world news headlines re latest wars/conflicts or what. It could be that I have an email now from bigfoot actually apologising!

Whatever - the big picture, if I can see it, is that for almost 10 years I guess I am had my bigfoot account - sure there have been problems in the past but this takes the biscuit as the worst outage by far and all with no explanation or time scale for actions so no wonder we are all damned annoyed.

But hey, some poor sod at bigfoot, some engineer will be working his butt off and getting no credit, and meanwhile people in the world are losing family, friends or whatever in bloodshed in Georgia etc.

I "think" I am going to grit my teeth and stick with bigfoot after all - one big letdown in 10 years is not as bad as some others have experienced - point is i could move and have endless stress moving to another provider but there is no sure holy grail out there when it comes to email/internet or whatever.

I think this problem will get fixed soon, its just a gut reaction for management at the company will know the boards on the web are filling up with critical comment of this damaged brand - that is what it is right now - but "if" the emails start flowing again in the next few days then I think I will not rush and change provider as I'd earlier said.

For the first time, over the weekend, I am getting "some" old emails through - all irregular and no pattern to it - but I recall thankfully last time bigfoot had a hitch that in the end everything did come through, albeit late of course.

Trouble is, I guess I have "invested" so much with the bigfoot email address that absolutely everyone I contact knows they can "forever" contact me via it - and that is a real powerful reason to bite my lip and stick with it regardless ofo the current "sh*t" we are gettting from them.

Of all the things I wish bigfoot would do would be something so simple and basic and manly; just post a web bulletin on their home page, apologise, tell us honestly what is being done and when it will be fixed etc - just straight talking iswhat we most want from bigfoot right now!

If things aren't flowing by the end of this new week i am going to look pretty stupid staying I guess - LOL!

Cheers!


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

This is a quick non-scientific test;

Are there any traits about the bigfoot account holders affected that match?

Free or paid account with bigfoot?

USA, UK, Europe, Asia or where registered?

My answers: fee paying bigfoot account/UK registered


Mike


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Mike,

I just arrived home. Well in the scheme of things this is small considering your post.

I too have a lot of time invested into the account but I also have 3 other email accounts so not every piece of my mail goes to bigfoot, only about 85%. To add to my fun my MacBook Pro power supply is acting up and going on and off.

As for looking for a pattern, I thought I was paying them, then I got the information when I logged on that they don't think I am. My problem is this is exactly how my last problem developed. They actually communicated with me and got it fixed. 

See you back here soon. Have a good week. BTW where are you in Europe. I am in New Jersey.

Regards,

Tom

So tomorrow I will try to get through to them. Tonight I will send another email and include the bounce back message that may help them figure this out. The bounce back shows about eight different mail servers before it failed and bounced.


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Mike,

I just checked my mail. I received two test messages I sent to myself and one where I CC myself I mailed one last night and the other this morning so maybe after I opted in they started up the account again. I still need to get that fixed and I have not received any outside email. One should have arrived as a confirm for a blue tooth headset I purchased on Friday.

BYE


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## kakalukiajay (Aug 10, 2008)

I am in Northern California.
I have had a free forwarding account for over 12 years.
None of my test e-mails have yet arrived.
No regular mail from friends et. al. who normally use bigfoot

My latest test e-mail comes back fairly quickly (within two minutes)
my_username@bigfoot.com
retry timeout exceeded


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi Tom,

Fingers crossed for today and the week ahead.

BTW I have just received a bounced email - I grabbed the header and it says

Spam-Warning: 210.109.98.21 is in a black list at korea.services.net, for
550 reason: Blocked due to spam, see http://korea.services.net

This doesn't look good!

Anyone else getting these or similar?


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## mikerog (Aug 10, 2008)

My setup is :-
Bigfoot user for 10 years plus 
UK based 
Free account


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## danoruk (Aug 11, 2008)

Hi,

Been trying to help my Dad who has had an account for years also. I've sent lots of test messages from differing accounts i.e. work, yahoo and a UK ISP, some have got through but others I'm still waiting for. Also tried forwarding to different address but got much the same results.

I got one of my work's techy's to take a look and this is what he came back with - very very intersting but time to say bye bye to bigfoot me thinks.

Hopefully this will help you make your mind up!

_The NDR below includes:_
_Connected to 211.115.216.225 but connection died. (#4.4.2)_
_I did an MX record lookup for bigfoot.com on __http://www.mxtoolbox.com/index.aspx__ and the IP listed in the NDR is the target for one of their MX records so that looks OK._
_The 4.4.2 error is recorded on the IETF website as:_
_4.4.2 No answer from host (4.1)_

_The outbound connection attempt was not answered, either because the remote system was busy, or otherwise unable to take a call. This is useful only as a persistent transient error._

_This means problem between messagelabs server and bigfoot server 211.115.216.225. Most likely problem is with Bigfoot as on the mxtoolbox website if you type in bigfoot.com as the domain you will see the list of SMTP servers resolved by the MX record lookup and the diagnostics test fails for each one meaning not only messagelabs but also MXtoolbox cant contact bigfoot systems over SMTP. I have used this diagnostics test on a number of other known email domains and they all passed. On another website I tried a ping test to 211.115.216.225 and this passed so the host is up though I cant actually try a telnet to port 25 from my system to check if it is listening for SMTP to be 100% (this could be something you try from home on your own PC)._

_Interestingly some of the bigfoot servers do also appear on SMTP blacklists which seem to suggest Bigfoot is running on Korean IP addresses._

_Bit of a mystery - sorry cant help further. _


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Thanks for the Update Dan, Looks like the problem I encountered with the bounce back. I just did a ping test and it failed. See below:

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.
C:\Documents and Settings\ >ping 211.115.216.225
Pinging 211.115.216.225 with 32 bytes of data:
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Ping statistics for 211.115.216.225:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 0, Lost = 4 (100% loss),
C:\Documents and Settings\

So it looks like we still have issues, I have not received any feedback from them yet and I sent a real long email with doc last night.

See U later


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

As much as it hurts to say it, I think bigfoot has a problem that is outside of its powers to fix for today I am getting a growing sense that it is not their own servers etc but that bigfoot itself now finds itself blocked by so many email forwarding servers as they deem it to be a key source of spam.

Today there have been a "dribble" of emails getting through - but all at most 3-4 days old - I think they usually keep trying for up to 6 days and hence it seems we are certainly at risk of not getting the emails since start of the month even if the backlog starts to come through.

Frustrating thing for all of us is there doesn't seem to be a consistent theme with some bouncing, some getting through, some going down a black hole and so on.

Hope some of you are having better luck!

Mike


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Mike,

I believe you are close to the truth. Have you seen these chaps over at the BT site?http://www.beta.bt.com/bta/forums/thread.jspa?messageID=34367

They have 3 pages of posts but they seem to not realize its not isolated to the UK.
You have to join to comment and I didn't want to join another group, especially one that I have no business being in.

I hoping to hear from Bigfoot sometime before Christmas with an answer. In the meantime I guess its start notifying your important contacts to use another email address.

Tom


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi Tom,

I guess that of all the things that disturb me, the question of "where does the email go that doesn't get to me" is top of the list.

IF the emails always bounced back to sender that wouldn't be too bad - but we all have tested by sending emails to our own accounts and whilst it may get through or it may get bounced the more frequent scenario is we hear nothing back [not even after 6 days or so that servers continue to try].

Does this mean the emails get "chewed up and destroyed" somewhere or that someone else captures them in some way [not saying deliberately but just sweeps up undelivered emails that sit somehow on weird and foreign servers "somewhere"?]

I just whish I knew more about this aspect.

My other concern is do I leave my bigfoot account "open" knowing others are bound to be trying to use it and that some emails in the system are at least getting to me - for if I cancel now those "in the pipeline" won't stand a chance of getting to me and again where will they end up?

Damned if we do and damned if we don't.

Tomorrow is a self imposed decision day for me and one last push over next 24 hours to try and get some positive results.

I'll lete you know what I find out today.

Thanks for suggestion of me joining other board too - but I'm not a bt user and somehow their board has more strength if its not just "us" repeating on that one.

Good luck!

Mike


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

Hello,

I'm new to this forum, I have a bigfoot account, and just like you, I receive nothing since several days.

I also own a dedicated server which is the incoming mail host for a couple domains. I have sent a test mail to my bigfoot address, and it is still in the queue.

Bigfoot does not accept any incoming mails ince a couple of days.

I have received several forwarded messages, all in one shot, delivered by bigfoot , on Aug 10 18:20 GMT
Since Aug 11 around 00:00 GMT, outgoing mail sent to bigfoot are still in the queue.
All SMTP servers with the name mail-kr.bigfoot.com with IP addresses [211.115.216.xxx] (xxx=222,226,228,252) simply do not reply.

All the e-mails you expect to receive are stuck on the senders SMTP servers and probably not within the Bigfoot garden.

As Bigfoot is down, you should not expect the any error message returned to their senders revealed your forwarding address.

Frederic
Belgium


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Welcome Frederic and Hi Mike,
Thanks for your enlightened feedback. As you can surmize from the posts there are a lot of people having this problem. I have not heard from Bigfoot support either. 

This is a big deal and maybe the time has come to open up the issue on some of the larger forums for all to see. The pressure from that exposure has to force some response from Bigfoot.

Going back to work, will write if I have any good news.

Tom


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

Just received 2 mails 2 hours ago via Bigfoot.
The outgoing message to bigfoot is still in the output queue.
Using a telnet command to port 25 of one of the mail servers shows this::


```
# telnet mail.bigfoot.com 25
Trying 211.115.216.225...
Connected to mail.bigfoot.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
Connection closed by foreign host.
# telnet mail.bigfoot.com 25
Trying 211.115.216.225...
Connected to mail.bigfoot.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
Connection closed by foreign host.
# telnet mail.bigfoot.com 25
Trying 211.115.216.228...
Trying 211.115.216.226...
Trying 211.115.216.225...
Trying 211.115.216.252...
Connected to mail.bigfoot.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
Connection closed by foreign host.
```
It is obviously *not* an IP routing problem. Just received no SMTP banner.

But... hmmm... Bigfoot is in China... or Singapore ? or Philippines ?
Any relationship with the Olympic Games ? some BigBrother killing the sessions ? 

Frédéric


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Hi

I have to run out but I found this info. They are in Asia.

http://www.sitetiki.com/Bigfoot.com

More Later.

Tom


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi Tom and all,

Things are at last beginning to come through! This afternoon in the UK I've had a dozen old emails to my inbox dated back to as old as 6th August.

OK, its not a flood but when I got up this morning there were a similar amount - so I am "daring to hope" that momentum is finally building and the backlog getting attended to.

I guess the next 2-3 days will inevitably be intermitment but from my experience of the past 12 days or so this is a huge improvement today.

I remember a hitch with bigfoot a couple of years ago that wasn't as large as this but it did have the same "ending" - not a rush all at once but a gradual release of the backlog until normal service resumed.

Anyone else getting/seeing a gradual improvement in the rate at which they are now arriving?


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Hi,

I have received two emails form CNET.Com and one from ZDNet Online, through Bigfoot. All three from previous days. I should be getting many more plus personal mail. So, something is going on but very slow. I still don't understand why we have heard nothing, I think I will lood around the net.

Tom


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

Imagine all the mail systems around the world, trying to send their messages to Bigfoot, probing once an hour or so. There are 8 MX's listed for their domain. Every try probes each of the 8 MX's in turn.

I hope they will be able to manage the flood when they open the gates, because outgoing mail piles up on the ISP mails servers around the globe.

This explains also why pending mail *will not* be delivered in the order of submission.

Frédéric


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

BTW I just got the proof that some mails are also queued within Bigfoot. It is somewhat complicated to explain. On Aug 10 18:20GMT, a message presented by Bigfoot was refused at my mail server during the SMTP transaction, and the bounce message has reached the sender today evening (Europe, exactly 2 days later).

Frédéric


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## DotHQ (May 6, 2008)

Sorry to hear about the Bigfoot.com email problems. 
I too signed up with Bigfoot in 97. I loved the idea of one email address for life. Great concept. Then came the spam. I didn't want to pay for the extra services so I moved away slowly. It was tough. I always liked Bigfoot.com. 
I hope they can recover from this issue and be back to business as normal very soon.  

Isn't it amazing how cut off we feel if we loose our email feed? Much worse than if the postal service didn't deliver the regular mail. Go figure. We've come a long way, but we are all very dependent on our email.


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Frédéric and All,
I got this off of the BT UK Forum, they seem to be told that it was a server upgrade that did not go right. Hmmmm. That was the same story in 2007. Is this the annual server outage due to human error event?

Quoted text taken from http://www.beta.bt.com/bta/forums/thread.jspa?threadID=4768&start=30&tstart=0

"I have just spoken to Bigfoot - twice.

First on 001 866 300 7155 where a cheery young lass in Connecticut said yes, they'd had a number of calls regarding a problem, and gave me the email 'tech guys' number to ring before wishing me a good week (is that a good omen, I wonder?).

I then called the 'tech guys' on 001 866 300 6720 and spoke to a fairly monosyllabic lad in New York who, as with the Connecticut girl, took my email and telephone number. He said he'd email the details to the email forwarding department. I told him I had been emailing Bigfoot for a week without any success. He didn't wish me a good week (is that a bad omen, I wonder?"


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

DotHQ said:


> .... I didn't want to pay for the extra services so I moved away slowly. ...


Too bad for paying members. If their e-mail address also ends with @bigfoot.com suffix, then their inbound mail is serviced by the same smtp servers too, that are dead.

Frédéric


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## mikerog (Aug 10, 2008)

Hi guys 
I am seeing a few emails dropping into one of my bigfoot accounts,
all emails are form .com and .net, nothing from .co.uk 
but nothing on my other account yet

In my 'testing phase' i have tried diverting my forwarding rule, but there has been no confirmation email from bigfoot to allow me to validate the request

Of course I took the time to add lots of nice header infor regarding all my rejection messges, and sent it of to [email protected].
Anyone guess what happend next??

It bounced back to me after 3 days. Doh !!

I agree or have seen all the entries here. Bigfoot definitely to blame !!
I have got SMTP errors from my email server (which I was just setting up when bigfoot crashed) so I thought ought i'd caused it all by rejecting their emails as user not found.

I bet Bigfoot blame me.. it would be a nice get out on their part.

Keep reporting progress, this is my "Bigfoot support forum", lacking an official one from the company in question


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

Three hours ago, mail-kr.bigfoot.com[211.115.216.226], was listed in a blacklist named zen.spamhaus.org. 
The consequence ? If the target server (which hosts the e-mail where bigfoot should forward your mails) has subscribed to this blocking list, the messages will be refused and bounced to their original senders.

Frédéric


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Blacklisting, can be a pain. I had this happen to my work address. The funny part was the guys who had us blacklisted were receiving financial support from our Community Relations Unit. They finally got their ISP to clear us out.

I just checked Spamhaus and that IP seems to have been removed. So maybe someone reported it.

I hope the guys at Bigfoot are doing as much as we seem to be trying. I am still getting a few emails but only a trickle. This did happen back in 2007 to me but not this bad or this long. The fact that we are not hearing anything in the way of a reply from Bigfoot is a surprise.

Thanks everyone for your efforts.


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

njtom said:


> Blacklisting, can be a pain. I had this happen to my work address.


This may happen with corporate servers because some of them accept all mail during the smtp transaction, and then some time later they issue bounce messages for their unknown users.

Spam mail messages usually carry faked sender mail addresses.

So, a spam mail sent from a far country, with envelope: from [email protected] to [email protected] (and domain1 is a honeypot, and domain2 works as explained above, and victim2 is an unknown user at domain2) -- this spam mail will be first accepted by mailserver.domain2.com, and then an new message with "user unknown" will be issued by domain2 to [email protected]. The honeypot will register one spam attack from domain2. Voilà.

Frédéric


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

Finally, things seem to go better.

A mail sent to myself via Bigfoot has remained 55 hours in the queue, and was accepted by Bigfoot today (6am GMT)
It has remained 17 minutes in the pipes within Bigfoot before being spit out to the forwarding address.

Frédéric


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

Again blacklisted



> Aug 13 14:39:10 r10051 postfix/smtpd[32396]: NOQUEUE: reject: RCPT from mail-kr.bigfoot.com[211.115.216.226]: 554 5.7.1 Servi
> ce unavailable; Client host [211.115.216.226] blocked using zen.spamhaus.org; http://www.spamhaus.org/query/bl?ip=211.115.216
> .226; from=<spamid.2148892426Xbounces.spamcop.net> to=<nospamXxxxxxx.net> proto=SMTP helo=<mail-kr.bigfoot.com>


and indeed
http://cbl.abuseat.org/lookup.cgi?ip=211.115.216.226 says that:


> IP Address 211.115.216.226 is currently listed in the CBL.
> It was detected at 2008-08-13 11:00 GMT (+/- 30 minutes), approximately 5 hours ago.
> It has been relisted following a previous removal at 2008-08-12 20:36 GMT
> 
> ...


Too bad for Bigfoot.

Frédéric


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Bad News!

I received a bounce back that I sent to [email protected].
I sent it out on Monday.


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi Tom and All!,

I thought things couldn't get worse - how wrong I was!

No, not bigfoot - this time my isp's email system has gone down too - so I can't even get email sent to/from my "real" email account etc and so even if bigfoot is/are sending emails to my account I can't see them in my inbox!

I pay a premium for bigfoot and the inbox there is filling up with bounced emails as well as about 60 "in" emails from past few days - so on the bigfoot issue alone it seems the number of emails getting through is gaining momentum.


If I don't post again on this site you can safely assume my broadband connection has flaked out too! - LOL!


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Mike,

I can really feel your pain. E-Mail is like electricity, we just take if for granted until something like this happens. 

I started to get a few emails but still see bounced mail from Bigfoot. 

I think I have decided to move all my mail to G-Mail since they seem to be very reliable and fast. 

Hang in there, in a few weeks you'll look back on all of this and smile.......we hope.

Tom


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi Mike and all,

I'm experiencing a new/"different" problem now;

A bit of background: years ago with bigfoot I forwarded emails to isp 1 with email account xxx and then switched to isp 2 so changed my forwarding email address to yyy.

Now, I am with third provider, with forwarding email address zzz.

Prior to hte bigfoot problems this past 2 weeks, all seemed fine.

Now though I am getting endelss mail can not be delivered/spam type messages for it seems xxx and yyy [although never given out to anyone!] are out there somehow and spam linked to them is now bouncing back to me and ending up in my zzz inbox!

Has anyone else changed their forwarding address over the years and nowfinding aat this time that their old forwarding addresses are in bounced emails somehow?

I can only hope this is a temporary problem linked to bigfoot outage!

below example email changed to <xxx> to protect account of course;

----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors -----
<xxx>

----- Transcript of session follows -----
>>> RCPT TO:<xxx>
<<< 550-X-Spam-Warning: 210.109.98.21 is in a black list at korea.services.net, for
550 reason: Blocked due to spam, see http://korea.services.net/blocked.phtml?addr=210.109.98.21

Anyone else getting this sort of thing?

Mike


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

mike9inch said:


> ----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors -----
> <xxx>
> 
> ----- Transcript of session follows -----
> ...


Hello Mike, you miss one important information. What postmaster account did send you the above error report ?
The IP address 210.109.98.21 is from South Korea, as well as the IP addresses from Bigfoot [211.115.216.***] ; your e-mail provider in the US seems to have choosen querying a blacklist (korea.services.net) where a lot of Korean networks are referenced.

You have to discuss with your e-mail provider (they block your legitimate e-mail) or with bigfoot (as they are a forwarding service, when they receive a spam for you, and don't reject/suppress it, they forward it to you, and then they are subject to be tagged as spammers themselves).
Or relocate bigfoot outside Korea 

Or forward your bigfoot e-mail to a less restrictive e-mail provider, that does not silent Korea.

Or leave Bigfoot, unfortunately.

Frédéric
Brussels


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Dear Frederick,

thank you for your reply. is this the other information I need to share:

I have changed the old forwarding email address here to [email protected] and changed the name of the isp address to "myoldisp" - not sure if I need to but I guess i'm just tritchy about posting such info on a board here etc.
--------------------------------------------------------

The original message was received at Tue, 12 Aug 2008 15:13:21 -0400 EST
from mail-kr.bigfoot.com [211.115.216.226]

----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors -----
<[email protected]>

----- Transcript of session follows -----
>>> RCPT TO:<[email protected]>
<<< 550-X-Spam-Warning: 210.109.98.21 is in a black list at korea.services.net, for
550 reason: Blocked due to spam, see http://korea.services.net/blocked.phtml?addr=210.109.98.21

Reporting-MTA: dns; bflitemail-kr1.bigfoot.com
Arrival-Date: Tue, 12 Aug 2008 15:13:21 -0400 EST

Final-Recipient: RFC822; <[email protected]>
Action: failed
Status: 5.1.1
Remote-MTA: DNS; mk-rewrite-2.mail.myoldispserviceprovider.com
Diagnostic-Code: SMTP; 550-X-Spam-Warning: 210.109.98.21 is in a black list at korea.services.net, for
550 reason: Blocked due to spam, see http://korea.services.net/blocked.phtml?addr=210.109.98.21
Last-Attempt-Date: Tue, 12 Aug 2008 15:13:21 -0400 EST


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Mike,

This is unbelievable. I have not had this happen to me. My current status is that I am receiving some email Not all email. As an example, I have a Netflix account, not sure if they operate in UK. Well its a paid service to rent DVD's. I returned some on Monday and should have received a confirm. Never came. The new DVD's just arrived but I did not receive an email saying they had been shipped. So, some mail is getting through. Also, old mail seems to not be getting through and I have not heard from Bigfoot.

So, I started using G-Mail.

I hope you get this fixed, keep us posted and I will do the same.

Tom


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## kakalukiajay (Aug 10, 2008)

In Northern California, I am finally getting "some" bigfoot mailings.
I lost out on about five days of "automatic copies of newsgroup" mail.
Some of my test e-mails took over three days to get to me.
Some of my test e-mails never got to me.

However, I also heard that google mail and other google Internet services were recently down for many hours or days.
If Google can not get it right, then us "customers" can only work-around what is currently the "state of the art" of occasional outages.


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi Kakalukiajay,

I think you make a very valid point about other service providers having problems too including google.

The lesson I have learnt, I guess, is to make sure I have a back up plan that can kick in if needed.

I relied totally on bigfoot gettng mail forwarded to me and then my isp for my inbox.

I've decided having my isp providr my inbox is too risky - it went down too this weekk for 3 days! 

I am going to stick with bigfoot despite the problems this past 2 weeks - everythnig now running to me smoothly I have to say thankfully - but these past days I have set up an emergency email forwarding service elsewhere and to an inbox not linked to my isp.

Thefrustration for most of us is just how "flaky" these systems/It are - if the email and microsoft were an aeroplane or a car we'd have crashed and burned almost daily since the millenium - surely soon the technology will get bedded down and be more robust - LOL what wishfull thinking.

The weird emails bouncing to me have stopped now too - I assume this was part of the bigfoot breakdown in service.

All in all I have leanrt a lot these past 2 weeks - I didn't even realise just how much I depended on this email let alone the problems it causes all concerned.

Getting things in context, this is the worst bigfoot breakdown in over 10 years of service and I would be stupid to walk away knowing all the pain and frustration I'd be taking on of trying to get 10 years of contacts to warm to/remember my new email address.

Even now, saying I am with "bigfoot" raises a smile for there are still millions of people who aren't familiar with it or the benefits of a lifetime email account.

At times like this, it is too easy to forget that recently when I switched email provider that it took just seconds to divert email to it via bigfoot and my contacts were totally oblivious as they continue to email bigoot as usual.

Goo luck - hope your emails are now coming in OK

I for one am not prepared to reply on Google that you mention - for it is the big daddy that will be the number 1 target of spammers and those intent on breaking into it etc too.

Cheers!

Mike


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

I own my domain name. That's for the life. 
All other freebies "for the life" *will* stop one day or another.

But with its 12-year existence (see http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.bigfoot.com ) Bigfoot is my best experience of free service. All other ones have lied, degraded up to an unusable state, or disappeared from the scene.

Frédéric
Brussels


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

To All,

Glad to hear that things are getting back to normal. I still have not received any reply from Bigfoot and I am still missing mail. I suspect its the Black Hole concept. Nothing comes out. 

As for G-Mail, I was lucky. I had no known problems but my volume is much less there. For now I too will stick with Bigfoot and see what happens. It's been nice communicating with all of you, it helps when you know your not alone in your frustration.

See you soon,

Tom


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

Hi njtom,

You will miss some messages. When bigfoot was down, the messages were queuing within the senders e-mail servers.

Each sysadmin can tune the settings of his servers, and the message is bounced back to its sender when it has remained too long in the queue, typically between 18 hours and 5 days.

But it seems that no e-mail has been lost - either returned to the sender (without revealing your forwarding address) - or finally delivered to its recipient.

Be aware that the Bigfoot servers still have some difficulties accepting inbound e-mail. This may induce delays as retries occur behind the scenes.

Frédéric


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Thanks for the update Frédéric my ISP gives up to 5 days but I think that is unusual and a long time. 

I know I lost some messages but at least they were returned. For now I'll stick to Bigfoot but I am not using it for new contacts.

Best regards,

Tom


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi Tom & all,

A weekend of reflection from me and I think I'm going the same route as you Tom - shifting new contacts elsewhere and then see how it goes.

I think I fell into the trap of getting "attached" to my bigfoot account and put too much reliance on this company.

From other web site postings it seems some paying customers with bigfoot are sometimes encountering problems when they try to leave it - fingers crossed we don't get such problems when the time comes to ditch bigfoot!

It's been nice to read your posts and others too - up until this thread I kind of felt isolated with the bigfoot problems I was having - I'll come back here in future in case of further problems. The brand is wounded for sure - its a real pity they have lost focus for it had such great customer relations in the early days.

In the meantime, good luck to all!

Cheers!

Mike


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## frirtz2cat (Aug 12, 2008)

I just dropped my 3-letter account name @bigfoot.com ... trust me, I'm here since the early days of the company. Sorry guys, too much spam.

I am still retaining another account I have heavily used on the usenet newsgroups, that account contains the word 'nospam'. This is the best antispam practice for going public with a true address. lol ! Those spammers certainly remove 'nospam' !

Frédéric


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Mike and Frédéric, and everyone else.

It was nice having others share the pain. I just set up my G-Mail account to forward my mail to my ISP. I have two ISP's one is an old dial up that I hang on to for emergencies. The other is my Cable Modem account. I feed both accounts through the cable account as well as the Bigfoot. Well I just performed a simple test. I mailed myself at G-Mail and received the forwarded mail within ten seconds. No kidding. Regardless of Google problems, I am sticking with G-Mail for forwarding.

I will really miss people looking at me funny when I told them my email was bigfoot.com. So long bigfoot. I guess more than your foot got too big.

For now it was a pleasure communicating with everyone. 

Regards and have a good week.


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi Tom,

Pleased to hear your gmail is going ok.

Personally, I'm very unsure about switching to google - for a whole host of security and other reasons others mention etc.

I have found an alternative and after what is now more than a month of daily experience can say it is refreshing to have found an email provider that is, well, shall we say as good astheir word and has a human response - yes, human - how cool is that in this era of auto-responders!

I can post a referer link here if anyone is interested.

I must warn you it is a pay for service - but you get what you pay for is an old sayin that springs to mind - If I get to receive one vital email that would otherwise be lost then I've justified the small annual premium.

All the best.

Mike


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## njtom (Aug 8, 2008)

Hi Mike,

Good to hear you've found a service. Yes please post a link. 

My wife and I still seem to be experiencing Bigfoot issues.

I am switching most of my mail to Gmail. I also have my own ISP and a very old dial up account that I have maintained because of these same type of issues. It costs me about $200. USD but at least they too have a human response and have been reliable. Maybe its worth the money to not have the same thing happen again.

Be well and enjoy the fall weather.


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi Tom,

I've posted the link to you privately - I don't want anyone to think I'm just trying to "spread the word" or generate spam leads or anything like that.

You should get my email in a few minutes or so.

But, for the sake of others I suggest keeping the link or naming it off this public forum thread.


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## lisle (Sep 22, 2008)

Am still having the same problems, emails arriving over 12 hours later, whilst other come in quickly within minutes.. i am tempted to give up now and move elsewhere.

Mike would welcome details of your provider

lisle


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## mike9inch (Jul 12, 2005)

Hi lisle,

email provider's link sent to you privately.

good luck


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## lisle (Sep 22, 2008)

Thanks Mike


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