Re: [Exim] rejected HELO ... syntactically invalid argument(…

Top Page
Delete this message
Reply to this message
Author: Tim Jackson
Date:  
To: exim-users
Subject: Re: [Exim] rejected HELO ... syntactically invalid argument(s)
Hi Andy, on Wed, 17 Mar 2004 10:04:19 -0500 you wrote:

> In my config_check_receipt I have this:
> deny message = host is listed in $dnslist_domain ($dnslist_text)
>          dnslists = list.dsbl.org:\
>                     sbl.spamhaus.org:\
>                     relays.ordb.org:\
>                     sbl-xbl.spamhaus.org:\
>                     bl.spamcop.net


Having sbl.spamhaus.org and sbl-xbl.spamhaus.org is a bit of a waste of
your resources, since sbl-xbl.spamhaus.org contains sbl.spamhaus.org in
its entirety. You'd be better just having sbl-xbl.

Also, bl.spamcop.net is very aggressive so be aware of that.

> rejected HELO from [200.118.112.12]: syntactically invalid argument(s):
> IBM_A31


It means what it says. "IBM_A31" is not a syntactically valid HELO
argument - underscores are not valid in hostnames.

> What exactly is happening here?
> Virus infected machine or massive spammer?


Could be either. I wouldn't worry about it either way. The reason why
you're seeing lots of log entries though is quite possibly because a lot
of misconfigured machines will keep coming back and hammering at your door
with unreasonable frequency if they get a 5xx error at HELO time.


Tim