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VERIFY(8postfix)                                              VERIFY(8postfix)

NAME
       verify - Postfix address verification server

SYNOPSIS
       verify [generic Postfix daemon options]

DESCRIPTION
       The  verify(8)  address  verification server maintains a record of what
       recipient addresses are known to be deliverable or undeliverable.

       Addresses are verified by injecting probe  messages  into  the  Postfix
       queue. Probe messages are run through all the routing and rewriting ma-
       chinery except for final delivery, and are discarded rather than  being
       deferred or bounced.

       Address  verification relies on the answer from the nearest MTA for the
       specified address, and will therefore not detect all undeliverable  ad-
       dresses.

       The  verify(8)  server  is designed to run under control by the Postfix
       master server. It maintains an optional persistent database.  To  avoid
       being interrupted by "postfix stop" in the middle of a database update,
       the process runs in a separate process group.

       The verify(8) server implements the following requests:

       update address status text
              Update the status and text of the specified address.

       query address
              Look up the status and text for the specified address.   If  the
              status  is  unknown, a probe is sent and an "in progress" status
              is returned.

SECURITY
       The address verification server is not security-sensitive. It does  not
       talk  to  the network, and it does not talk to local users.  The verify
       server can run chrooted at fixed low privilege.

       The address verification server  can  be  coerced  to  store  unlimited
       amounts  of  garbage. Limiting the cache expiry time trades one problem
       (disk space exhaustion) for another one (poor response time  to  client
       requests).

       With Postfix version 2.5 and later, the verify(8) server no longer uses
       root privileges when opening the  address_verify_map  cache  file.  The
       file should now be stored under the Postfix-owned data_directory.  As a
       migration aid, an attempt to open a cache file under a non-Postfix  di-
       rectory  is redirected to the Postfix-owned data_directory, and a warn-
       ing is logged.

DIAGNOSTICS
       Problems and transactions are logged to syslogd(8) or postlogd(8).

BUGS
       Address verification probe messages add additional traffic to the  mail
       queue.    Recipient   verification  may  cause  an  increased  load  on
       down-stream servers in the case of a dictionary attack or  a  flood  of
       backscatter  bounces.   Sender address verification may cause your site
       to be blacklisted by some providers.

       If the persistent database ever gets corrupted then the world comes  to
       an  end and human intervention is needed. This violates a basic Postfix
       principle.

CONFIGURATION PARAMETERS
       Changes to main.cf are not picked up automatically, as  verify(8)  pro-
       cesses are long-lived. Use the command "postfix reload" after a config-
       uration change.

       The text below provides only a parameter summary. See  postconf(5)  for
       more details including examples.

PROBE MESSAGE CONTROLS
       address_verify_sender ($double_bounce_sender)
              The  sender address to use in address verification probes; prior
              to Postfix 2.5 the default was "postmaster".

       Available with Postfix 2.9 and later:

       address_verify_sender_ttl (0s)
              The time between changes in the time-dependent  portion  of  ad-
              dress verification probe sender addresses.

CACHE CONTROLS
       address_verify_map (see 'postconf -d' output)
              Lookup table for persistent address verification status storage.

       address_verify_positive_expire_time (31d)
              The time after which a successful probe expires from the address
              verification cache.

       address_verify_positive_refresh_time (7d)
              The time after which a  successful  address  verification  probe
              needs to be refreshed.

       address_verify_negative_cache (yes)
              Enable caching of failed address verification probe results.

       address_verify_negative_expire_time (3d)
              The  time  after  which  a failed probe expires from the address
              verification cache.

       address_verify_negative_refresh_time (3h)
              The time after which a failed address verification  probe  needs
              to be refreshed.

       Available with Postfix 2.7 and later:

       address_verify_cache_cleanup_interval (12h)
              The  amount of time between verify(8) address verification data-
              base cleanup runs.

PROBE MESSAGE ROUTING CONTROLS
       By default, probe messages are delivered via the same route as  regular
       messages.   The  following  parameters can be used to override specific
       message routing mechanisms.

       address_verify_relayhost ($relayhost)
              Overrides the relayhost parameter setting for address  verifica-
              tion probes.

       address_verify_transport_maps ($transport_maps)
              Overrides the transport_maps parameter setting for address veri-
              fication probes.

       address_verify_local_transport ($local_transport)
              Overrides the local_transport parameter setting for address ver-
              ification probes.

       address_verify_virtual_transport ($virtual_transport)
              Overrides  the  virtual_transport  parameter setting for address
              verification probes.

       address_verify_relay_transport ($relay_transport)
              Overrides the relay_transport parameter setting for address ver-
              ification probes.

       address_verify_default_transport ($default_transport)
              Overrides  the  default_transport  parameter setting for address
              verification probes.

       Available in Postfix 2.3 and later:

       address_verify_sender_dependent_relayhost_maps   ($sender_dependent_re-
       layhost_maps)
              Overrides  the sender_dependent_relayhost_maps parameter setting
              for address verification probes.

       Available in Postfix 2.7 and later:

       address_verify_sender_dependent_default_transport_maps  ($sender_depen-
       dent_default_transport_maps)
              Overrides  the sender_dependent_default_transport_maps parameter
              setting for address verification probes.

SMTPUTF8 CONTROLS
       Preliminary SMTPUTF8 support is introduced with Postfix 3.0.

       smtputf8_autodetect_classes (sendmail, verify)
              Detect that a message requires SMTPUTF8 support for  the  speci-
              fied mail origin classes.

       Available in Postfix version 3.2 and later:

       enable_idna2003_compatibility (no)
              Enable   'transitional'   compatibility   between  IDNA2003  and
              IDNA2008, when converting UTF-8 domain names to/from  the  ASCII
              form that is used for DNS lookups.

MISCELLANEOUS CONTROLS
       config_directory (see 'postconf -d' output)
              The  default  location of the Postfix main.cf and master.cf con-
              figuration files.

       daemon_timeout (18000s)
              How much time a Postfix daemon process may take to handle a  re-
              quest before it is terminated by a built-in watchdog timer.

       ipc_timeout (3600s)
              The  time limit for sending or receiving information over an in-
              ternal communication channel.

       process_id (read-only)
              The process ID of a Postfix command or daemon process.

       process_name (read-only)
              The process name of a Postfix command or daemon process.

       queue_directory (see 'postconf -d' output)
              The location of the Postfix top-level queue directory.

       syslog_facility (mail)
              The syslog facility of Postfix logging.

       syslog_name (see 'postconf -d' output)
              A prefix that  is  prepended  to  the  process  name  in  syslog
              records, so that, for example, "smtpd" becomes "prefix/smtpd".

       Available in Postfix 3.3 and later:

       service_name (read-only)
              The master.cf service name of a Postfix daemon process.

SEE ALSO
       smtpd(8), Postfix SMTP server
       cleanup(8), enqueue Postfix message
       postconf(5), configuration parameters
       postlogd(8), Postfix logging
       syslogd(8), system logging

README FILES
       Use  "postconf readme_directory" or "postconf html_directory" to locate
       this information.
       ADDRESS_VERIFICATION_README, address verification howto

LICENSE
       The Secure Mailer license must be distributed with this software.

HISTORY
       This service was introduced with Postfix version 2.1.

AUTHOR(S)
       Wietse Venema
       IBM T.J. Watson Research
       P.O. Box 704
       Yorktown Heights, NY 10598, USA

       Wietse Venema
       Google, Inc.
       111 8th Avenue
       New York, NY 10011, USA

                                                              VERIFY(8postfix)

NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | SECURITY | DIAGNOSTICS | BUGS | CONFIGURATION PARAMETERS | PROBE MESSAGE CONTROLS | CACHE CONTROLS | PROBE MESSAGE ROUTING CONTROLS | SMTPUTF8 CONTROLS | MISCELLANEOUS CONTROLS | SEE ALSO | README FILES | LICENSE | HISTORY | AUTHOR(S)