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Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP)
By Won Lee
What is SMTP?
Stands for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol
Used for sending and receiving electronic mail efficiently and reliably
Daily function of life
Used daily by the billions
History of SMTP
SMTP outgrew others in 1970’s. Jonathan Postel wrote the SMTP
definition in August 1982. Documented under Request for
Comments (RFC) 821 Used by small collection of military,
universities, and corporate research laboratories.
Connections were slow and unreliable but was only used by a handful of people.
Hist of SMTP (cont.)
Number of hosts were recognizable by each other.
Focused on Reliability rather then Security. People helped by configuring system to
“open relay”. Meaning a configured host would accept
any mail meant for other systems and relay it to the mail’s final destination.
First spam in 1978 by Salesman from DEC
SMTP Specifications
SMTP mail transaction is a text-based protocol that is done in three steps.
Firstly, the transaction starts with a MAIL command that gives the sender identification.
Followed by a series of one or more RCPT commands, giving the receiver information.
Finally, a DATA command initiates transfer of the mail data and is terminated by the “end of mail” data indicator, which also confirms the transaction.
SMTP is mainly delivery protocol and uses POP3 or IMAP to receive messages that’s being queued.
Visual Specification
Privacy
Not encrypted
Email passes through intermediate computer
Internet Service Provider (ISP) holds backup copies
Security
Rise of Con artists, hackers, & spammers
Wasn’t based on security to start with
Hard to retrofit a new security mechanism onto something widely used as SMTP.
Pervasiveness
Choice of easy and fast communication throughout the world.
247 billions emails sent daily
90 trillion sent in year 2009
Reliability
Was based on Reliability
Emails do get lost due to crowded and spammed servers
Unpredictable timeliness between sender & receiver
Interoperability
No point of emails if it’s not interoperable
Anywhere around the world
To any connected device (i.e. PC’s to Smart Phones)
Support of the Community Anybody that is a
member of the IETF
Has been updated many times in different RFCs
Shares ideas how to keep unwanted emails out (i.e. spam, hackers)
Ease of Use
So easy a kid can do it
User friendly software/interface
No coding necessary, unlike old times.
Application of SMTP
Almost any device with internet connectivity.
Web based mail: yahoomail, gmail, hotmail, and many more that nobody even heard of.
Software such as; Outlook Express, Mozilla Thunderbird, Iphone, Blackberry.
Can be used for personal or business use.
Conclusion
It’s makes life very easy to communicate with people around the world.
Fast, cheap, and easy to use.
Definitely be around in the future because of its convenience.