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Why you shouldn't use "catch all" mailboxes

This is another post in my serious of articles on why you shouldn't use certain features in Exchange, even though they are there. As with the other articles, the article does NOT tell you how to enable the feature in question.
In this post I am going to outline why a "catch all" mailbox is a bad idea.
Many of the points in this article also apply to enabling the option to have a copy of any Non Delivery Reports delivered to someone else in the Exchange org.
This post applies to all email servers, not just Exchange though.

I actually completed this post some time ago, I just never got round to putting it on the blog. However I have recently seen a problem with a SBS Server where a catch all mailbox was used, which I am going to blog on separately, so thought this article should go up first.

The other articles in this series to date are:

Why you shouldn't use logos in signatures ( http://blog.sembee.co.uk/archive/2008/04/14/76.aspx )
Why you shouldn't enable the POP3 Server ( http://blog.sembee.co.uk/archive/2008/03/03/71.aspx )
Why you shouldn't use the POP3 connector ( http://blog.sembee.co.uk/archive/2006/09/25/28.aspx )
Why you shouldn't use a self generated SSL certificate ( http://blog.sembee.co.uk/archive/2006/03/05/9.aspx )
Why you shouldn't put Exchange 2003 in to a DMZ ( http://blog.sembee.co.uk/archive/2006/02/23/7.aspx )


Where does the request come from?

Newcomers to Exchange will often ask where is the "catch all" option, particularly if they are used to that option provided by their ISP with POP3 mailboxes, or are coming from the POP3 connector on Small Business Server.
It may also be asked by a manager, in the mistaken belief that they are missing out on important emails when someone mistypes the email address.

Of course Exchange doesn't support catch all mailboxes, which is why the question is asked.

Similarly, I have seen servers with the "Send copy of Non Delivery Report to..." option set on the SMTP virtual server so that someone gets a copy of the message which can be forwarded on to the relevant person. Of course that is just a COPY, the sender will already have received the NDR, and then may get confused when their message is replied to, despite getting an NDR saying it wasn't delivered.

Why are they a bad idea?

Catch all mailboxes have been a bad idea since the late 1990s, with the growth of worms on the internet that make up email addresses.
In short, a catch all mailbox means that every email address on your server is valid. Therefore the bots that create email addresses based on common name combinations will be able to successfully deliver their messages to your server.

As such, if you enable a catch all, then someone needs to monitor the mailbox constantly for the odd valid email message. Depending on the number of users, the number of messages that could by saved by the catch all may be one or two a day at most.

Meanwhile the person monitoring the mailbox will be deleting the vast majority of the messages, as they will be spam and virus infected messages.
The fact that messages have been delivered at all is also a security risk. If the message is opened or the attachment looked at because it seems legitimate, then the payload could be executed. However if the message had been dropped then it would not even get the chance.

By dropping messages to invalid recipients you will save on bandwidth as the messages do not have to be delivered and on processing power, as the messages do not have to be processed by your AV, Antispam and then Exchange.

Furthermore, if a spammer decides to launch an NDR attack, or simply sends a large amount of spam to your domain, then the messages will be delivered. You may find that you have a mailbox that Outlook cannot open because it has 150,000 messages in it.

I have posted on this blog in the past about VAMSOFT ORF which uses emails to non-valid addresses as a feature to block spam, to great effect. If you are receiving 10,000 messages a day to non-valid address then that would be a tremendous waste of bandwidth - I have a client who drops this kind of level a day.

What is the problem with "Send copy of Non Delivery Report to..." option?

With the "Send copy of Non Delivery Report" option, if you have that set, you are actually being a poor internet citizen. To receive a copy of the Non Delivery Report (NDR) you need to allow the message to be delivered. The server then attempts to send the original NDR back to the sender. However if the message is a virus or spam message (which is most likely) then the sender will be spoofed. Your server is then a source of "back scatter" which could lead to a poor spam score or even blacklisting.
During the last major email-borne virus attack, there were more back scatter NDRs going back and forth than infected messages.
 
Your server is also exposed to an NDR attack or NDR spam attempt, as the server will accept the message and then try and send it back to the "sender" who is the real target of the message.
I have more on NDR attacks on my spam clean up page: http://www.amset.info/exchange/spam-cleanup.asp

Then there is the internal security aspect. If someone senior makes a typo in a confidential email address, this could be seen by someone else, who possibly should not. The original sender will be unaware of this, because they will still get a copy of the NDR.

What are the alternatives?

If you have Exchange 2003 or higher on Windows 2003 SP1 or higher, then enable the recipient filter and tar pit option (instructions: http://www.amset.info/exchange/filter-unknown.asp ). Anyone who sends an email to the wrong address will get a failure immediately. If they are a legitimate sender then they will call or email someone else to get the correct email address.
On older versions of Exchange or if you can't set the tar pit, for example when Exchange 2003 is installed on Windows 2000 where the option isn't available, then setting recipient filtering can actually expose your server to attack, as it cannot defend itself from a directory harvest - therefore a third party tool is required such as Vamsoft's ORF to do recipient filtering and the tar pit.
For other email server products, you should check for recipient validation functionality. If it doesn't exist, but an LDAP lookup option is available, then something like VAMSOFT ORF can query an LDAP database for valid addresses, so could be used as an SMTP gateway. ( http://www.amset.info/exchange/gateway.asp )

If you are aware of a common misspelling, for example Steven and Stephen, then add the misspelling to the user's account as an additional email address. That will ensure that the common misspellings are delivered, without exposing your server.

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