Search code examples
phpdnsmx-record

MX lookup query to resolve ALL subdomains

I am searching on problem that i am facing that suppose, i am having a domain name "abhinav.com" and my mail address is "[email protected]".

But i want that if someone types a email like "[email protected]" and sends the mail, then the email is received by my mail server.

I am searching for the MX records settings which would be helpful for me to proceed in my research.

As is have the only lead that this is only done by DNS settings. if someone faced the same problem earlier please do help.

if something is not clear please refer to the website because these guys had done the exact same thing.

URL:- http://getnotify.com

Solution

  • To answer your question, you will need to create an MX record with a * (wildcard) as the name and add the mail server so it will accepted ALL subdomains.

    You can see this working on my domain:

    http://mxtoolbox.com/SuperTool.aspx?action=mx%3agoogle.com.kitson-online.co.uk&run=toolpage#

    As a side note, I think you may be getting confused with how this system works. It's not tracking by adding a domain suffix but rather by adding an image with an external source to the email which then downloads the content from the server and stores the IP/Time of Download into in a database.

    Example:

    1. [email protected] -> goes to mail server from MX record of domain getnotify.com
    2. getnotify.com strips .getnotify.com from email string, adds an image with a link to external source (img name is probably associated to your account) and then relays the email to [email protected].
    3. When the email is received and viewed, the email renders within the mail client and attempts to pull external img source from getnotify.com.
    4. getnotify.com can see this img request has checked in and then adds this data along with IP address (that's your Geographic Data) to a database.

    I can tell you now that this will not work 100% of the time as most clients will not render emails until the users accepts to download from external sources. Plus, this is traceable as the content will be available to recipient within the source and headers just not available at first glance.

    See extract taken from GetNotify FAQ

    How does GetNotify Email tracking work?

    GetNotify works by adding a small invisible tracking image in your outgoing Emails. When your Email recipient opens your Email, this image gets downloaded from GetNotify server. So GetNotify will know exactly when your sent Email was opened and it notifies you through an Email that your sent Email is read by the recipient.