A Note About Verizon Online Email Service

If you are a Verizon Online customer or if you send email to Verizon Online customers, you should be aware of important changes made recently to the company’s email service, regarding Port 25 sending and receiving restrictions effective November 3, 2009. Here is the official notice released by Verizon Online:

Dear Verizon Online Customer,

Verizon Online will soon be making changes to our network to further strengthen the security of our customers’ email messages and our network and to help prevent spam.

We have blocked incoming email from Port 25, which is the default port used by email programs to connect to email servers and to send email, for some time now.  We are now taking the additional step of blocking outgoing e-mail messages from Port 25 to help ensure that our network is not used by spammers.  Depending on whether you use a web-based email service or an email program such as Microsoft Outlook®, you may need to make changes to your computer settings to ensure that your ability to send email is not interrupted.

If you use a web-based Email service (either Verizon.net or a third party email service, such as Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, AOL, etc.):

• If you use a web-based email service to send your email, you do not need to do anything as our implementation of Port 25 blocking for outgoing email messages will not affect your ability to send or receive web-based email.

If you use a third party Email service such as Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, AOL and an Email program such as Microsoft Outlook:

• If you use an email service other than Verizon.net (such as Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, AOL, etc.) to send email through a program like Microsoft Outlook, you will need to make the following modification to your computer settings so that your ability to send email will not be affected:

• Change the port number in the “Advanced” section of your email program from Port 25 to Port 587.  Detailed instructions on how to change the port settings on your computer can be found at www.verizon.net/port25.

• If you’re using an email provider other than Verizon.net (such as Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, AOL, etc.) to send email through your email program and you are unable to send email after making the change to Port 587, please contact your email provider for additional information on their recommended port settings.

The above changes are necessary in order to allow you to continue to send email through your email program after November 3, 2009.

Thank you for being a valued Verizon customer.

Sincerely,

Verizon Online

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 24th, 2009 at 5:57 pm and is filed under General Business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.