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Message transfer agent

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Revision as of 19:45, 17 September 2023 by 105.113.79.55 (talk) (→Operation: spam aletts)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff) Software to transfer electronic mail

Within the Internet email system, a message transfer agent (MTA), or mail transfer agent, or mail relay is software that transfers electronic mail messages from one computer to another using the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol. In some contexts the alternative names mail server, mail exchanger, and MX host can be used to describe an MTA.

Messages exchanged across networks are passed between mail servers, including any attached data files (such as images, multimedia or documents). These servers also often keep mailboxes for email. Access to this email by end users is typically either via webmail or an email client.

L

Transfer versus access

A relay or filtering server will typically store email only briefly, but other systems keep full mailboxes for email - in which case they usually support some means for end users to access their email via a Mail User Agent (MUA), or email client.

Common protocols for this are:

Submission of new email from a mail client is via SMTP, typically on port 587 or 465, and is now generally restricted to servers the user has an account with-such as their ISP. This is for policy, not technical, reasons so that providers have some means of holding their users accountable for the generation of spam and other forms of email abuse.

See also

References

  1. MTA=Message Transfer Agent (similar to X.400 name) is found, e.g., in RFC 1506, RFC 2476, RFC 3461, RFC 3464, RFC 3865, RFC 3888, RFC 6409, RFC 5598.
  2. MTA=Mail Transfer Agent (similar to Mail Transfer Protocol) is found, e.g., in RFC 2298, RFC 2305, RFC 3804, RFC 3798, RFC 4496, RFC 5442, RFC 5429.
  3. RFC 5598, Internet Mail Architecture, D. Crocker (July 2009).
  4. Bill Cole (29 June 2009). "What are the IPs that sends mail for a domain?". ASRG mailing list. Retrieved 15 September 2009.
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