PHP Mail gets blocked by spam filters

Hello,
I need to be able to send email in PHP without it getting filtered by
spam filters. Gmail usually filters all email sent using the "mail()"
function. I've looked on the forums, and am using the function below.
However, it seems to display alot of the meta data inside the email
itself. Is there something I'm doing wrong? Does anyone have any
suggestions/example that will send a well-formed email (with all the
meta data in tact)?

Thanks in advance,
Jason Ho
Founder Clockspot.net
http://www.clockspot.net


function send_mail($to, $body, $subject, $fromaddress, $fromname,
$attachments=false)
{
$eol="\r\n";
$mime_boundary=md5(time());

# Common Headers
$headers .= "From: ".$fromname."<".$fromaddress.">".$eol;
$headers .= "Reply-To: ".$fromname."<".$fromaddress.">".$eol;
$headers .= "Return-Path: ".$fromname."<".$fromaddress.">".
$eol; // these two to set reply address
$headers .= "Message-ID: <".time()."-".$fromaddress.">".$eol;
$headers .= "X-Mailer: PHP v".phpversion().$eol; // These
two to help avoid spam-filters

# Boundry for marking the split & Multitype Headers
$headers .= 'MIME-Version: 1.0'.$eol.$eol;
$headers .= "Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary=\"".
$mime_boundary."\"".$eol.$eol;

# Open the first part of the mail
$msg = "--".$mime_boundary.$eol;

$htmlalt_mime_boundary = $mime_boundary."_htmlalt"; //we must define
a different MIME boundary for this section
# Setup for text OR html -
$msg .= "Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary=\"".
$htmlalt_mime_boundary."\"".$eol.$eol;

# Text Version
$msg .= "--".$htmlalt_mime_boundary.$eol;
$msg .= "Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1".$eol;
$msg .= "Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit".$eol.$eol;
$msg .= strip_tags(str_replace("<br>", "\n", substr($body,
(strpos($body, "<body>")+6)))).$eol.$eol;

# HTML Version
$msg .= "--".$htmlalt_mime_boundary.$eol;
$msg .= "Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1".$eol;
$msg .= "Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit".$eol.$eol;
$msg .= $body.$eol.$eol;

//close the html/plain text alternate portion
$msg .= "--".$htmlalt_mime_boundary."--".$eol.$eol;

if ($attachments !== false)
{
for($i=0; $i < count($attachments); $i++)
{
if (is_file($attachments[$i]["file"]))
{
# File for Attachment
$file_name = substr($attachments[$i]["file"],
(strrpos($attachments[$i]["file"], "/")+1));

$handle=fopen($attachments[$i]["file"], 'rb');
$f_contents=fread($handle, filesize($attachments[$i]
["file"]));
$f_contents=chunk_split(base64_encode($f_contents)); //
Encode The Data For Transition using base64_encode();
$f_type=filetype($attachments[$i]["file"]);
fclose($handle);

# Attachment
$msg .= "--".$mime_boundary.$eol;
$msg .= "Content-Type: ".$attachments[$i]["content_type"].";
name=\"".$file_name."\"".$eol; // sometimes i have to send MS Word,
use 'msword' instead of 'pdf'
$msg .= "Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64".$eol;
$msg .= "Content-Description: ".$file_name.$eol;
$msg .= "Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=\"".
$file_name."\"".$eol.$eol; // !! This line needs TWO end of lines !!
IMPORTANT !!
$msg .= $f_contents.$eol.$eol;
}
}
}

# Finished
$msg .= "--".$mime_boundary."--".$eol.$eol; // finish with two
eol's for better security. see Injection.

# SEND THE EMAIL
ini_set(sendmail_from,$fromaddress); // the INI lines are to force
the From Address to be used !
$mail_sent = mail($to, $subject, $msg, $headers);

ini_restore(sendmail_from);

return $mail_sent;
}
jason.m.ho [ Mo, 03 September 2007 18:25 ] [ ID #1811328 ]

Re: PHP Mail gets blocked by spam filters

jason.m.ho [at] gmail.com wrote:
> Hello,
> I need to be able to send email in PHP without it getting filtered by
> spam filters. Gmail usually filters all email sent using the "mail()"
> function. I've looked on the forums, and am using the function below.
> However, it seems to display alot of the meta data inside the email
> itself. Is there something I'm doing wrong? Does anyone have any
> suggestions/example that will send a well-formed email (with all the
> meta data in tact)?
>
> Thanks in advance,
> Jason Ho
> Founder Clockspot.net
> http://www.clockspot.net
>

<code snipped>

Gmail (or any MTA) doesn't know if the mail comes from the mail()
function or something else. All it knows is what's in the mail.

Take a look at the source for an email which gets through Gmail and
compare them to the source of one which gets filtered. What's the
difference?

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex [at] attglobal.net
==================
Jerry Stuckle [ Mo, 03 September 2007 20:02 ] [ ID #1811329 ]

Re: PHP Mail gets blocked by spam filters

jason.m.ho [at] gmail.com wrote:
> Hello,
> I need to be able to send email in PHP without it getting filtered by
> spam filters.

Avoid things that would make the mail to be classed as spam, like HTML tags
and false headers (copy headers from a mail client like outlook express).

Also see to that the sending server has a proper reverseDNS and isn't included
at some of the major blacklists.




--

//Aho
Shion [ Mo, 03 September 2007 20:29 ] [ ID #1811330 ]

Re: PHP Mail gets blocked by spam filters

On Sep 3, 11:02 am, Jerry Stuckle <jstuck... [at] attglobal.net> wrote:
>
> Take a look at the source for an email which gets through Gmail and
> compare them to the source of one which gets filtered. What's the
> difference?

Additionally, make sure that the domain in the "From:" field and the
domain on which the SMTP server resides are the same (for example, if
you are sending mail from user [at] example.com, it should be sent through
an SMTP server in the *.example.com domain). Also, make sure that
your SMTP server is not blacklisted.

Cheers,
NC
nc [ Mo, 03 September 2007 23:01 ] [ ID #1811331 ]

Re: PHP Mail gets blocked by spam filters

"jason.m.ho [at] gmail.com" <jason.m.ho [at] gmail.com> wrote in
news:1188836731.304199.283080 [at] 57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com:

> Hello,
> I need to be able to send email in PHP without it getting filtered by
> spam filters. Gmail usually filters all email sent using the "mail()"
> function. I've looked on the forums, and am using the function below.
> However, it seems to display alot of the meta data inside the email
> itself. Is there something I'm doing wrong? Does anyone have any
> suggestions/example that will send a well-formed email (with all the
> meta data in tact)?

it's definitely harder to do these days.

i've had several large networks (roadrunner, verizon) block all mail from
my server until i sent them a nice email explaining that my mail-list is
double opt-in, and that we are the only people on the IP.

having a reverse-lookup on the IP your mail originates from match the
domain you're sending from will be very helpful.
Good Man [ Mo, 03 September 2007 23:18 ] [ ID #1811332 ]
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