Zones
Combined Blocklist
Status: Production Type: IPv4, IPv6 Cloud DNS namespace: <APIKEY>.combined.mail.abusix.zone. Rsync File: lists/black.zone, lists/exploit.zone, lists/dynamic.zone Return Codes: 127.0.0.2, 127.0.0.3, 127.0.0.200, 127.0.0.4, 127.0.0.11, 127.0.0.12 Test Points: 127.0.0.2, 127.0.0.3, 127.0.0.200, 127.0.04, 127.0.0.11, 127.0.0.12, ::FFFF:7F00:2, ::FFFF:7F00:3, ::FFFF:7F00:4 Listing Duration: Varies (see individual list for details) Description This list is used for inbound mail and aggregates all of our recommended IP lists into a single query for convenience and speed. The “combined” list includes the black, exploit, and policy IP lists.Spam Blocklist
Status: Production Type: IPv4, IPv6 Cloud DNS namespace: <APIKEY>.black.mail.abusix.zone. Rsync File: lists/black.zone Return Codes: 127.0.0.2, 127.0.0.3, 127.0.0.200 Test Points: 127.0.0.2, 127.0.0.3, 127.0.0.200, ::FFFF:7F00:2, ::FFFF:7F00:3 Listing Duration: Approximately 5.2 days from when traffic was last seen Description This list contains the IP addresses of hosts that have sent emails to our primary traps. These traps are domains that have never been used for genuine mail or have rejected all mail for over a year. The list also includes some manual network entries that we maintain. Common causes for being listed here include compromised accounts, infected hosts, botnets, spam gangs, purchased email address lists, poor sign-up processes, open web forms, open proxies, TOR exit nodes, and VPNs. If this data find any matching IP address, it will return 127.0.0.2. In addition, some automated heuristics use all of our trap networks and partner transaction feeds to look for IP addresses with very low reputation or IPs in the same vicinity of hosts hitting our primary traps. IPs found in this data will return 127.0.0.3. We also maintain a number of semi-permanent manual listings, which will return 127.0.0.200. This list can also be safely used to check each “Received” header hop found within a message if your MTA or spam filter can do so. Example query:Exploit Blocklist
Status: Production Type: IPv4, IPv6 Cloud DNS namespace: <APIKEY>.exploit.mail.abusix.zone. Rsync File: lists/exploit.zone Return Codes: 127.0.0.4 Test Points: 127.0.0.2, 127.0.0.4, ::FFFF:7F00:2, ::FFFF:7F00:4 Listing Duration: Approximately 5.2 days from when traffic was last seen Description This list is generated by monitoring the behavior of hosts that connect to our traps and our partner’s mail services. It includes any IP address that exhibits behavior specific to compromised hosts, botnet/virus infections, proxies, VPNs, TOR exit nodes, or IPs that are NAT’ing for these hosts. These behaviors are not expected from a genuine SMTP client. You can also use this list to check each “Received” header hop found within a message safely. Example query:Policy Blocklist
Status: Production Type: IPv4 only Cloud DNS namespace: <APIKEY>.dynamic.mail.abusix.zone. Rsync File: lists/dynamic.zone Return Codes: 127.0.0.11, 127.0.0.12 Test Points: 127.0.0.2, 127.0.0.11, 127.0.0.12 Listing Duration: Indefinitely Description This zone is our email “Policy” blocklist. It contains a list of all IP addresses that should not be connecting directly to external SMTP servers. Instead, they should use their ISP or mailbox provider’s smarthost to relay messages using some form of SMTP authentication. The purpose of this list is to preemptively identify any IP that is unsuitable for use with an SMTP server. This helps to immediately catch newly compromised hosts, hijacked IP space, and other threats without requiring trap hits for listings.💡 It is normal for a non-SMTP server IP to be listed in this zone. This will not cause any ill-effects, e.g. it will not prevent mail from being sent from this IP or range.The list is built by constantly scanning the entire IPv4 range and applying a policy that states:
- [An IP address MUST have rDNS.](https://abusix.com/glossary/internet-protocol-address/)
- rDNS_ must not be ‘templated,’ e.g., two or more octets of the IP address MUST NOT appear (this can be in hex, decimal, etc.) within the rDNS label (there are exceptions for static* mail* mx* smtp*, etc.) and should reflect the hostname of the SMTP server._
- [Contiguous ranges of IP addresses MUST NOT have the same rDNS.](https://abusix.com/glossary/internet-protocol-address/)
❗ Warning This zone should only be used on border SMTP hosts, not smart hosts or SMTP AUTH outbound servers, as you could block your customers. This list should never be used for Received headers hops or for anything other than checking IP addresses that hand off to your mail server(s), as doing so will cause significant numbers of false positives.Delisting Anyone can request a delisting from this zone, and a semi-permanent exception will be created automatically. Exceptions are only pruned when they are no longer necessary. Still, in the future, we may require that Policy exceptions are revalidated once per year to prevent them from becoming stale.
💡 Note We do not allow delists of CIDR ranges from the Policy list. Only IPs that meet the policy requirements are delisted. If you have updated your rDNS recently and would like us to re-scan it, please get in touch with us via our support channels, and we will do this for you.Example query:
💡 Note to Rsync users policy.zoneBlacklistrDNS policy.zone
Domain Blocklist
Status: Production Type: Domain, IPv4 Cloud DNS namespace: <APIKEY>.dblack.mail.abusix.zone. Rsync File: lists/dblack.zone Return Codes: 127.0.1.1, 127.0.1.2, 127.0.1.3 Test Points: *.test, 127.0.0.2, 127.0.1.1, 127.0.1.2, 127.0.1.3 Listing Duration: Approximately 5.2 days after last seen Description This list applies to both inbound and outbound mail and contains domains and IP addresses found in the message body of spam received by our primary traps. We also follow any short URL links found in spam and list any intermediate or destination domains.💡 Info This list should be used as a URI DNSBL (e.g., checking domain names or IP addresses found in the message body), but can also be used as an RHSBL where the rDNS, SMTP HELO, MAIL FROM domain, DKIM d= domain, Message-ID domain, and List-Unsubscribe headers are checked against it. The list should not be used to check the connecting IP address, though only IP addresses are in the message body.127.0.1.1 is returned for domains/IPs found in the message body. 127.0.1.2 is returned for newly observed domains (found using other trap types). 127.0.1.3 is returned for domains found by following short URLs.
💡 Info The list of wildcards domains to make this list as easy to implement as possible. That means the zone lists the parent domain and any sub-domains, so you don’t need to normalize the hostname or domain name before querying.Example query:
💡Note When creating the domain list, we found that many spams go to great lengths to evade detection, using open redirectors, short URLs, and online drive services like Google Drive and Yandex Disk. Thus, we created several lists to combat this; see the shorthash and diskhash lists. When dblack, shorthash, and drivehash are combined, you will get the best possible coverage and protection available.
Shorthash Blocklist (short URLs)
Status: Production Type: SHA-1 Hash Cloud DNS namespace: <APIKEY>.shorthash.mail.abusix.zone. Rsync File: lists/shorthash.zone Return Codes: 127.0.3.1 Test Points: 127.0.02, 127.0.3.1, *.test, d2e4345eef7b21a542ed6d7c3dd191585b344461 (abusix.ai/testpoint), f4d986915d728956d139397effd00fee0e3725e4 (abusix.ai/testpoint/hash/short) Listing Duration: Approximately 5.2 days after last seen Description This list applies to both inbound and outbound mail. Its purpose is to block short URLs seen in the message body of spam sent to our primary traps. The domain blacklist is complemented by this list because short URLs have become a common way for spammers to avoid domain blacklisting by hiding behind these services. However, listing some short URL domains may cause significant false positives. Additionally, these shortening services are usually very poor at handling abuse of their services. Since it is impossible to represent a full URL in a DNS query, the short URLs are first normalized, then SHA-1 hashed, and the hash value is used for lookup instead of the URL. To normalize the short URL, remove the scheme, then take only the “hostname” (in lowercase) and “pathname”, and then calculate the SHA-1 hash of the result.💡Info As this is an entirely new type of anti-spam check, it will require support to be added to your chosen mail platform. **Rspamd **Please look at our set-up instructions for rspamd, which contains the necessary code to do these lookups. See link
Diskhash Blocklist (drive URLs)
Status: Production Type: SHA-1 Hash Cloud DNS namespace: <APIKEY>.diskhash.mail.abusix.zone. Rsync File: lists/diskhash.zone Return Codes: 127.0.3.2 Test Points: 127.0.0.2, 127.0.3.2, *.test, d2e4345eef7b21a542ed6d7c3dd191585b344461 (abusix.ai/testpoint), 2f07095f95bc86bc310febc625ee9327a69fde0b (abusix.ai/testpoint/hash/disk) Listing Duration: Approximately 5.2 days after last seen Description This list applies to both inbound and outbound mail. Its purpose is to identify and list URLs for online file storage services that appear in the message body of spam that is sent to our primary traps. This list is complementary to the domain blacklist, as spammers often use online file storage services like Google Drive and Yandex Disk to avoid IP and domain blacklisting by hiding behind these services. Unfortunately, these services are often poor at handling abuse of their services. Since it is impossible to represent a full URL in a DNS query, the URLs are first normalized, then SHA-1 hashed, and the hash value is used for lookup instead of the URL. To normalize the short URL, remove the scheme, then take only the “hostname” (in lowercase) and “pathname”, and finally calculate the SHA-1 hash of the result.💡Info As this is an entirely new type of anti-spam check, it will require support to be added to your chosen mail platform. **Rspamd **Please look at our set-up instructions for rspamd, which contains the necessary code to do these lookups. See link
Authbl Blocklist
Status: Production Type: IPv4, IPv6 Cloud DNS namespace: <APIKEY>.authbl.mail.abusix.zone. Rsync File: lists/authbl.zone Return Codes: 127.0.0.4 Test Points: 127.0.0.2, 127.0.0.4, ::FFFF:7F00:2, ::FFFF:7F00:4 Listing Duration: Approximately 12 hours from when traffic was last seen Description This list is used for outbound mail and is a subset of the exploit zone. However, it only includes hosts that have been seen in the last 12 hours, instead of the usual 5.2 days. The shorter listing time is intended to avoid false positives where an IP address is returned to a DHCP pool. The list includes the IP addresses of infected hosts, botnet members, proxies, VPNs, TOR exit nodes, and hosts attempting to authenticate to our honeypots. It is intended to be used for identifying and preventing account compromises or as a blocklist for preventing listed hosts from authenticating to your services running on HTTP, IMAP, SMTP, SSH, etc. This can prevent dictionary attacks, brute force, or logging in with phished credentials, among other things. Postfix In Postfix, you may use this list to prevent authenticated users from relaying mail from listed IPs (e.g., where the account could be compromised). In main.cf you would set “smtpd_relay_restrictions” to the following (or add this if missing):Welcome List
Status: Production Type: IPv4, IPv6, Domain Cloud DNS namespace: <APIKEY>.white.mail.abusix.zone. Rsync File: lists/white.zone Return Codes: 127.0.2.1 Test Points: 127.0.0.2, ::FFFF:7F00:2, 127.0.2.1 Listing Duration: Varies Description This list aggregates multiple whitelist sources, including IPv4, IPv6, and domains. All sources return the same return code. The sources of this list are:- DNSWL (IP)
- Return-Path Whitelist (IP)
- Return-Path Whitelist (Domain)
- Abusix Whitelist (IP)
- Abusix Whitelist (Domain)