Outlook Can't Send to Earthlink's Server (requires authentication)

L

LarryH

I'm posting this in case anyone else spends 24 frustrating hours trying
to figure out why they can't send outgoing mail. In truth, it would
effect any pop client software but since my problem was found while
wrestling with OL -- here goes.

Obviously, Earthlink's smtpauth.earthlink.net server requires
authentication. That means the username (which includes the
@xxxxxx.xxx) and pword have to be entered into the proper fields for
outgoing mail.

Well, it seems the password I was using, which worked PERFECTLY on their
webmail and on the POP incoming server, was at fault (sorta.)
Apparently, Earthlink's smtp server only accepts eight characters in the
password. So, in short, on their own, they truncated the password to
eight characters.

As an example, if your pword is tommybobby and you find that that works
just fine on the web and for incoming -- head's up -- it won't work to
get you into their outgoing server -- you have to turn it into tommybob
or you'll end up aged, (I'm now a bald-headed, staggering man where once
I was young and spry) trying to figure it out.

Hope this helps someone.
 
L

Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]

LarryH said:
I'm posting this in case anyone else spends 24 frustrating hours
trying to figure out why they can't send outgoing mail. In truth, it
would effect any pop client software but since my problem was found
while wrestling with OL -- here goes.

Obviously, Earthlink's smtpauth.earthlink.net server requires
authentication. That means the username (which includes the
@xxxxxx.xxx) and pword have to be entered into the proper fields for
outgoing mail.

Well, it seems the password I was using, which worked PERFECTLY on
their webmail and on the POP incoming server, was at fault (sorta.)
Apparently, Earthlink's smtp server only accepts eight characters in
the password. So, in short, on their own, they truncated the
password to eight characters.

As an example, if your pword is tommybobby and you find that that
works just fine on the web and for incoming -- head's up -- it won't
work to get you into their outgoing server -- you have to turn it
into tommybob or you'll end up aged, (I'm now a bald-headed,
staggering man where once I was young and spry) trying to figure it
out.

Hope this helps someone.
Click to expand...

Good to know - just sounds odd as a POP account password is generally
supplied by Earthlink and you can't change it yourself.
 
C

Claude J Ortega

Good to know - just sounds odd as a POP account password is generally
supplied by Earthlink and you can't change it yourself.
Click to expand...

As I recall, the 'standard' password crypt process is to use only the first 8
characters, throwing the rest away. So earthlink's web & pop crypt program is
'non-standard' if it is using all of the entered characters to derive the
encrypted value.
 
J

Jeff Stephenson [MSFT]

You're refering to an *implementation*, not a *standard*. There's nothing
in any of the Internet mail protocols that restricts the length of a
password, and in fact doing so makes passwords less secure (longer is better
in terms of security) and leads to problems like the one that Larry
mentioned.
 
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