full-disclosure - How VeriSign's SiteFinder service breaks Outlook Express

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Message-ID: <000701c37f8d$98081a50$550ffea9@rms>
From: rms at computerbytesman.com (Richard M. Smith)
Subject: How VeriSign's SiteFinder service breaks Outlook Express

Hello,

I discovered that VeriSign's SiteFinder service breaks Microsoft's
Outlook Express email reader.  If a user misspells a domain name in
their POP3 or SMTP server name, Outlook Express no longer provides
meaningful error messages to a user to help them to fix the problem.

Here are the expected error messages in Outlook Express for a misspelled
domain name:

   The host 'smtp.rcntypodomain.us' could not be 
   found. Please verify that you have entered the 
   server name correctly. Account: 'pop.rcn.com', 
   Server: 'smtp.rcntypodomain.us', Protocol: SMTP, 
   Port: 25, Secure(SSL): No, Socket Error: 11004, 
   Error Number: 0x800CCC0D

   The host 'pop.rcntypodomain.us' could not be found. 
   Please verify that you have entered the server name 
   correctly. Account: 'pop.rcn.com', Server: 
   'pop.rcntypodomain.us', Protocol: POP3, Port: 110, 
   Secure(SSL): No, Socket Error: 11004, Error Number: 
   0x800CCC0D

With SiteFinder, here are the error messages that are now produced:

   The message could not be sent because one of the 
   recipients was rejected by the server. The rejected 
   e-mail address was 'rms@...puterbytesman.com'. 
   Subject 'Testing 1 2 3', Account: 'pop.rcn.com', 
   Server: 'smtp.rcntypodomain.com', Protocol: SMTP, 
   Server Response: '550 <unknown[24.91.207.165]>: 
   Client host rejected: The domain you are trying 
   to send mail to does not exist.', Port: 25, 
   Secure(SSL): No, Server Error: 550, Error 
   Number: 0x800CCC79

   The connection to the server has failed. Account: 
   'pop.rcn.com', Server: 'pop.rcntypodomain.com', 
   Protocol: POP3, Port: 110, Secure(SSL): No, Socket 
   Error: 10061, Error Number: 0x800CCC0E

Similar problems may exist in other email readers and other
Internet-enabled software.  This Outlook Express problem raises
questions about what kind of testing VeriSign did to understand the
collateral damage to application software from the SiteFinder service
before the service was turned on.

Richard M. Smith
http://www.ComputerBytesMan.com