Exchange Server - open relay!

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I’ve just inherited a new SBS box and as usual inherited a whole load of problems.

The guys who hosted the clients email used to hold the email on a POP3 server on a remote site and each PC would pull the email down with Outlook express. Now they don’t support the network (I do) so they basically switched off the POP3 access. That was nice of them.

I managed to re-point the MX of the email domain to the SBS server. While this was migrating I pushed out Outlook 2003 from the server and migrated the email from Express into the Outlook profile. I then sat back and waited for the DNS to replicate and then for the email to start finding its way in, but no.

Looked in Exchange system manager and the server is relaying spam all over the place and this brought the server to a crawl. I took the server offline and service packed Exchange and did a full virus scan but nothing was found. I also checked a DNS report on the domain and it is listed as a ‘open relay’ arrgh!

Does anyone have any tips on how to lock down SMTP in Exchange? I’ve read some of the guides on the net but no joy.

 

Looks like another sleepless night for me. I have configured a new Exchange server back at HQ so if there are major problems with SBS I can point the mail there and configure the clients to pull it down with POP3 taking Exchange (on SBS) out of the way.

I need a holiday...

 

It was just the server I.P (I think that was in there)

update: problem fixed. After closer investigation there is a spam filter on the server which relays email to the Exchange server (looks messy!). I have disabled it and changed the SMTP virtual server to listen on port 25, it was listening on a different port as the spam filter was listening port 25. Did a 'open relay' test and it passed, yay!

Legit email is now starting to flow as I had to delete the whole queue directory in the mailroot folder as ESM would crash when I tried to purge the emails.

I dunno why there is a spam filter on the server as this is the first time Exchange component has been used :hhhmmm