This is the beginning of the message I receive:

The bounce message has an error code which you chose not to post (for whatever reason). Please post the entire error message.

Here it is (I've obscured the actual addresses):

This message was created automatically by the mail system (ecelerity).

A message that you sent could not be delivered to one or more of its recipients. This is a permanent error. The following address(es) failed:

>>> xxxxxxxxxx@aol.com (while not connected): 554 5.4.7 [internal] exceeded max retries without delivery

Arrival-Date: Mon, 04 Sep 2017 05:36:15 -0400 Reporting-MTA: dns; smtp02.onyx.dfw.sync.lan

Diagnostic-Code: smtp; 554 5.4.7 [internal] exceeded max retries without delivery Status: 5.4.7 Last-Attempt-Date: Mon, 04 Sep 2017 05:36:15 -0400 Action: failed Final-Recipient: rfc822; xxxxxxxxxx@aol.com

Return-Path: <xxxxxxxxxx@embarqmail.com> DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha1; d=embarqmail.com; s=ctl201402; c=relaxed/simple; q=dns/txt; i=@embarqmail.com; t=1504216901; h=From:Subject:Date:To:MIME-Version:Content-Type; bh=pFllT6deL03DuGi8fDm5PDnmfOY=; b=cduLJ0gzJIUb+QgDjO7/ve9zb9m3g0CqtumlA1gJZlJZRiANeblBfeMb49y+1ECh 6otL8PlIRMHR2Z7Hy/TTAKAgoXMcrcwDKrrRIC4PqIRgMn6dXxTkq8vv3nHVGkVJ XNl+hf5ERJ4Fm7LWU8z/NVv7cAlyCEGos9+QPvv7y8ufV1yoblJzoYfK8YB09ROn e9suhP2esaoLCmZ++C+rIGMxEyH1zLtXmpJDee/Q4AGaXuSu+s8UGJPNMM05jd11 nTibn/HR5lUzBR+booGDPHyy/jwCDzJo9bYuXC8d9svkdjOW+37fdIs+feHJfOhJ pSen65XSlfU046HPw2vewg==; X_CMAE_Category: , , X-CNFS-Analysis: v=2.2 cv=Jvezl4wC c=1 sm=1 tr=0 a=WtNzym3lrSBSrAHJkM37QA==:117 a=WtNzym3lrSBSrAHJkM37QA==:17 a=KGjhK52YXX0A:10 a=x7bEGLp0ZPQA:10 a=84avDakS_KMA:10 a=KeKAF7QvOSUA:10 a=r77TgQKjGQsHNAKrUKIA:9 a=SYfl2ZiqAAAA:8 a=8pif782wAAAA:8 a=Zpk3ecEdAAAA:8 a=hKTk3blrfO9QYDZfk9gA:9 a=LGtgqMrrTU_KP5n7:21 a=u5CyxewZHQ0Q-oFw:21 a=QEXdDO2ut3YA:10 a=-URcvs9AFaAA:10 a=vMic74P-ingA:10 a=h4T2oxQ2pKUA:10 a=3oc9M9_CAAAA:8 a=UTEjyl7vulIrDmFBH-QA:9 a=LtE5oIyL-1_M_1M3:21 a=zGXMogf2_tJ4UeLR:21 a=BIa6GmmhWHcf451M:21 a=_W_S_7VecoQA:10 a=EVqukXgXMJOrABBeqjvu:22 X-CM-Score: 0 X-Scanned-by: Cloudmark Authority Engine Authentication-Results: smtp02.onyx.dfw.sync.lan smtp.user=xxxxxxxxxx; auth=pass (LOGIN) Received: from [71.52.97.194] ([71.52.97.194:56355] helo=[10.10.10.104]) by smtp.centurylink.net (envelope-from <xxxxxxxxxx@embarqmail.com>) (ecelerity 3.6.25.56547 r(Core:3.6.25.0)) with ESMTPSA (cipher=DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA) id 9B/AF-31489-44788A95; Thu, 31 Aug 2017 18:01:41 -0400 Subject: Re: Fwd: Here are 4 Simple questions from an attorney To: Fred xxxxxx <xxxxxxxxxx@aol.com> References: <52E0D9A8-A984-4071-8E07-EF50A90CAEE1@gmail.com>

<94CD6E3C-51B6-4D21-B923-A92ED3196C57@aol.com>

From: Carolyn xxxxxx <xxxxxxxxxx@embarqmail.com> Message-ID: <ee036e40-88ab-76ad-086f-cd3ab1137020@embarqmail.com> Date: Thu, 31 Aug 2017 18:01:38 -0400 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; WOW64; rv:52.0) Gecko/20100101

Thunderbird/52.3.0

MIME-Version: 1.0 In-Reply-To: <94CD6E3C-51B6-4D21-B923-A92ED3196C57@aol.com> Content-Type: multipart/alternative;

boundary="------------8F04F3EE973ABDDFAE7B2AF2"

Content-Language: en-US

Your email provider's SMTP server couldn't deliver the message to the AOL SMTP server. Error code 5.4.7 indicates 'Security features not supported'.

You should talk to your email provider. All this has got nothing to do with Thunderbird.

Thank you for your response.

It seems like CenturyLink and Thunderbird just blame each other for whatever goes wrong. Sigh...

The thing is that I can send mail to .aol addresses if I use webmail. That's why CenturyLink says it's not their problem.

Merry-Widow said

Thank you for your response. It seems like CenturyLink and Thunderbird just blame each other for whatever goes wrong. Sigh... The thing is that I can send mail to .aol addresses if I use webmail. That's why CenturyLink says it's not their problem.

Century link run the server, not anyone involved with thunderbird. You have to accept that you provider wants you to use their web mail. Why. Because it offer them the opportunity to advertise to you and it represents a lower cost in providing support. They can lower support costs by just not supporting mail clients, but they feel, rightly so that their business customers using outlook would buck. So they continue to tacitly support mail clients, but really their support staff no absolutely nothing about them and the scripts they have all end with, "If you can send mail from web mail then it is client XXX fault." Am I cynical. Yes I am.

However the message says "554 5.4.7 [internal] exceeded max retries without delivery" this means that the century link mail server has tried more than once to deliver mail to the mail to the AOL server and failed miserably each time. The usual causes of these replies are difficult to establish but generally fall into

1. Email address does not exist or is incorrectly stated in the mail envelope. 2. The mail server is not accepting mail from that mail server (often the sending server is on a spam blacklist) 3. The recipients mail box is full and the server is not accepting further mail for that account.

While all three of those reasons have error codes of their own, there is nothing forcing a server to offer anything intelligible when it refuses mail.

So to your mail provider. When you send mail, Thunderbird contact your mail provider and hand off the email for delivery. Thunderbird maintains a send mail dialog until such time as the receiving server says that it has the mail and it is Ok for delivery. Then Thunderbird files your mail in the sent folder. If the email is not Ok for delivery you will see a dialog advising you of an issue.

What you are receiving is a delivery status notification (DSN) from the century link server. Historically a mail server would continue to try and deliver a mail over a three day period and then give up. I am assuming that is what is happening here. Exactly what pattern of attempts the server makes is up to the server administrator and many there days only try once.

We are not blaming your provider just to get you off the phone as it were. We are pointing you to your provider because they are the ones in a position to tell you what is going on, after all it is their server emailing you to say their was a delivery problem. Their failure to provide support in response to an email from them is not really something we have control over. Your provider has access to mail sending logs that show exactly what occurred when they contacted the AOL server. The best we can do is guess.

I did check the DNS record for embarqmail.com

The report suggests.

• the mail exchanger of record (MX) is mx.centurylink.net but the sMTP server anounces itself as 220 smtp.embarq.synacor.com ESMTP
• Malformed greeting or no A records found matching banner text . If this is not set correctly, some mail platforms will reject or delay mail from you, and can cause hard to diagnose issues with deliverability.

Basically I think your provider is letting the side down in maintaining their systems and AOL is aggressive in trying to get rid of SPAM through rejecting mail where the MX and banner are mismatched.

It's very kind of you to go to the trouble of explaining all this to me. I think I am understanding what you are saying. Of course, I still have no idea of what to do about the problem. Several of the .aol recipients are relatives, and why everything should work for so long and then suddenly not work is beyond me.

I maintain four email accounts, and I very much prefer using an email client to using webmail. I like having my emails available even when I'm not on the internet, and I like having access to each account with a click.

I guess I'll experiment with a little reconfiguring , but I'm not hopeful.

Excellent diagnosis of the problem. I have (had?) the identical problem, hopefully now resolved after my weekly one-hour phone conversation with Centurylink.net tech support. Like Merry widow I will experiment with some different configurations. Thanks Matt. Johnande