path: root/doc/rfc/rfc3464.txt

Network Working Group                                           K. Moore
Request for Comments: 3464                       University of Tennessee
Obsoletes: 1894                                             G. Vaudreuil
Category: Standards Track                            Lucent Technologies
                                                            January 2003


    An Extensible Message Format for Delivery Status Notifications

Status of this Memo

   This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the
   Internet community, and requests discussion and suggestions for
   improvements.  Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet
   Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state
   and status of this protocol.  Distribution of this memo is unlimited.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2003).  All Rights Reserved.

Abstract

   This memo defines a Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME)
   content-type that may be used by a message transfer agent (MTA) or
   electronic mail gateway to report the result of an attempt to deliver
   a message to one or more recipients.  This content-type is intended
   as a machine-processable replacement for the various types of
   delivery status notifications currently used in Internet electronic
   mail.

   Because many messages are sent between the Internet and other
   messaging systems (such as X.400 or the so-called "Local Area Network
   (LAN)-based" systems), the Delivery Status Notification (DSN)
   protocol is designed to be useful in a multi-protocol messaging
   environment.  To this end, the protocol described in this memo
   provides for the carriage of "foreign" addresses and error codes, in
   addition to those normally used in Internet mail.  Additional
   attributes may also be defined to support "tunneling" of foreign
   notifications through Internet mail.











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Table of Contents

   1. Introduction ....................................................3
     1.1 Purposes .....................................................3
     1.2 Requirements .................................................4
     1.3 Terminology ..................................................5
   2. Format of a Delivery Status Notification ........................7
     2.1 The message/delivery-status content-type .....................9
      2.1.1 General conventions for DSN fields ........................9
      2.1.2 "*-type" sub-fields .......................................9
      2.1.3 Lexical tokens imported from RFC 822 .....................10
     2.2 Per-Message DSN Fields ......................................11
      2.2.1 The Original-Envelope-Id field ...........................11
      2.2.2 The Reporting-MTA DSN field ..............................12
      2.2.3 The DSN-Gateway field ....................................13
      2.2.4 The Received-From-MTA DSN field ..........................14
      2.2.5 The Arrival-Date DSN field ...............................14
     2.3 Per-Recipient DSN fields ....................................14
      2.3.1 Original-Recipient field .................................15
      2.3.2 Final-Recipient field ....................................15
      2.3.3 Action field .............................................16
      2.3.4 Status field .............................................18
      2.3.5 Remote-MTA field .........................................19
      2.3.6 Diagnostic-Code field ....................................19
      2.3.7 Last-Attempt-Date field ..................................20
      2.3.8 final-log-id field .......................................20
      2.3.9 Will-Retry-Until field ...................................20
     2.4 Extension fields ............................................21
   3. Conformance and Usage Requirements .............................22
   4. Security Considerations ........................................23
     4.1 Forgery .....................................................23
     4.2 Confidentiality .............................................23
     4.3 Non-Repudiation .............................................25
   5. References .....................................................25
   6. Acknowledgments ................................................26
   Appendix A - Collected Grammar ....................................27
   Appendix B - Guidelines for Gatewaying DSNS .......................29
     Gatewaying from other mail systems to DSNs ......................29
     Gatewaying from DSNs to other mail systems ......................30
   Appendix C - Guidelines for Use of DSNS By Mailing List Exploders .30
   Appendix D - IANA Registration Forms for DSN Types ................31
     IANA registration form for address-type .........................32
     IANA registration form for diagnostic-type ......................32
     IANA registration form for MTA-name-type ........................32
   Appendix E - Examples .............................................33
     Simple DSN ......................................................34
     Multi-Recipient DSN .............................................35
     DSN from gateway to foreign system ..............................36



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     Delayed DSN .....................................................37
   Appendix F - Changes from RFC 1894 ................................38
   Authors' Addresses ................................................39
   Full Copyright Statement ..........................................40

1. Introduction

   This memo defines a Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME)
   [MIME1] content-type for Delivery Status Notifications (DSNs).  A DSN
   can be used to notify the sender of a message of any of several
   conditions: failed delivery, delayed delivery, successful delivery,
   or the gatewaying of a message into an environment that may not
   support DSNs.  The "message/delivery-status" content-type defined
   herein is intended for use within the framework of the
   "multipart/report" content type defined in [REPORT].

   This memo defines only the format of the notifications.  An extension
   to the Simple Message Transfer Protocol (SMTP) [SMTP] to fully
   support such notifications is the subject of a separate memo [DRPT].

   Document Conventions

   The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
   "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
   document are to be interpreted as described in BCP 14, RFC 2119
   [RFC2119].

1.1 Purposes

   The DSNs defined in this memo are expected to serve several purposes:

   (a) Inform human beings of the status of message delivery processing,
       as well as the reasons for any delivery problems or outright
       failures, in a manner that is largely independent of human
       language and media;

   (b) Allow mail user agents to keep track of the delivery status of
       messages sent, by associating returned DSNs with earlier message
       transmissions;

   (c) Allow mailing list exploders to automatically maintain their
       subscriber lists when delivery attempts repeatedly fail;

   (d) Convey delivery and non-delivery notifications resulting from
       attempts to deliver messages to "foreign" mail systems via a
       gateway;





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   (e) Allow "foreign" notifications to be tunneled through a MIME-
       capable message system and back into the original messaging
       system that issued the original notification, or even to a third
       messaging system;

   (f) Allow language-independent and medium-independent, yet reasonably
       precise, indications of the reason for the failure of a message
       to be delivered; and

   (g) Provide sufficient information to remote MTA maintainers (via
       "trouble tickets") so that they can understand the nature of
       reported errors.  This feature is used in the case that failure
       to deliver a message is due to the malfunction of a remote MTA
       and the sender wants to report the problem to the remote MTA
       administrator.

1.2 Requirements

   These purposes place the following constraints on the notification
   protocol:

   (a) It must be readable by humans as well as being machine-parsable.

   (b) It must provide enough information to allow message senders (or
       the user agents) to unambiguously associate a DSN with the
       message that was sent and the original recipient address for
       which the DSN is issued (if such information is available), even
       if the message was forwarded to another recipient address.

   (c) It must be able to preserve the reason for the success or failure
       of a delivery attempt in a remote messaging system, using the
       "language" (mailbox addresses and status codes) of that remote
       system.

   (d) It must also be able to describe the reason for the success or
       failure of a delivery attempt, independent of any particular
       human language or of the "language" of any particular mail
       system.

   (e) It must preserve enough information to allow the maintainer of a
       remote MTA to understand (and if possible, reproduce) the
       conditions that caused a delivery failure at that MTA.

   (f) For any notifications issued by foreign mail systems, which are
       translated by a mail gateway to the DSN format, the DSN must
       preserve the "type" of the foreign addresses and error codes, so
       that these may be correctly interpreted by gateways.




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   A DSN contains a set of per-message fields that identify the message
   and the transaction during which the message was submitted, along
   with other fields that apply to all delivery attempts described by
   the DSN.  The DSN also includes a set of per-recipient fields to
   convey the result of the attempt to deliver the message to each of
   one or more recipients.

1.3 Terminology

   A message may be transmitted through several message transfer agents
   (MTAs) on its way to a recipient.  For a variety of reasons,
   recipient addresses may be rewritten during this process, so each MTA
   may potentially see a different recipient address.  Depending on the
   purpose for which a DSN is used, different formats of a particular
   recipient address will be needed.

   Several DSN fields are defined in terms of the view from a particular
   MTA in the transmission.  The MTAs are assigned the following names:

   (a) Original MTA

       The Original MTA is the one to which the message is submitted for
       delivery by the sender of the message.

   (b) Reporting MTA

       For any DSN, the Reporting MTA is the one which is reporting the
       results of delivery attempts described in the DSN.

       If the delivery attempts described occurred in a "foreign" (non-
       Internet) mail system, and the DSN was produced by translating
       the foreign notice into DSN format, the Reporting MTA will still
       identify the "foreign" MTA where the delivery attempts occurred.

   (c) Received-From MTA

       The Received-From MTA is the MTA from which the Reporting MTA
       received the message, and accepted responsibility for delivery of
       the message.

   (d) Remote MTA

       If an MTA determines that it must relay a message to one or more
       recipients, but the message cannot be transferred to its "next
       hop" MTA, or if the "next hop" MTA refuses to accept
       responsibility for delivery of the message to one or more of its
       intended recipients, the relaying MTA may need to issue a DSN on
       behalf of the recipients for whom the message cannot be



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       delivered.  In this case the relaying MTA is the Reporting MTA,
       and the "next hop" MTA is known as the Remote MTA.

   Figure 1 illustrates the relationship between the various MTAs.

+-----+    +--------+           +---------+    +---------+      +------+
|     |    |        |           |Received-|    |         |      |      |
|     | => |Original| => ... => |  From   | => |Reporting| ===> |Remote|
| user|    |   MTA  |           |   MTA   |    |   MTA   | <No! |  MTA |
|agent|    +--------+           +---------+    +----v----+      +------+
|     |                                             |
|     | <-------------------------------------------+
+-----+      (DSN returned to sender by Reporting MTA)

     Figure 1. Original, Received-From, Reporting and Remote MTAs

   Each of these MTAs may provide information that is useful in a DSN:

   + Ideally, the DSN will contain the address of each recipient as
     originally specified to the Original MTA by the sender of the
     message.

     This version of the address is needed (rather than a forwarding
     address or some modified version of the original address) so that
     the sender may compare the recipient address in the DSN with the
     address in the sender's records (e.g., an address book for an
     individual, the list of subscribers for a mailing list) and take
     appropriate action.

     Similarly, the DSN might contain an "envelope identifier" that was
     known to both the sender's user agent and the Original MTA at the
     time of message submission, and which, if included in the DSN, can
     be used by the sender to keep track of which messages were or were
     not delivered.

   + If a message was (a) forwarded to a different address than that
     specified by the sender, (b) gatewayed to a different mail system
     than that used by the sender, or (c) subjected to address rewriting
     during transmission, the "final" form of the recipient address
     (i.e., the one seen by the Reporting MTA) will be different than
     the original (sender-specified) recipient address.  Just as the
     sender's user agent (or the sender) prefers the original recipient
     address, so the "final" address is needed when reporting a problem
     to the postmaster of the site where message delivery failed,
     because only the final recipient address will allow her to
     reproduce the conditions that caused the failure.





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   + A "failed" DSN should contain the most accurate explanation for the
     delivery failure that is available.  For ease of interpretation,
     this information should be a format that is independent of the mail
     transport system that issued the DSN.  However, if a foreign error
     code is translated into some transport-independent format, some
     information may be lost.  It is therefore desirable to provide both
     a transport-independent status code and a mechanism for reporting
     transport-specific codes.  Depending on the circumstances that
     produced delivery failure, the transport-specific code might be
     obtained from either the Reporting MTA or the Remote MTA.

   Since different values for "recipient address" and "delivery status
   code" are needed according to the circumstance in which a DSN will be
   used, and since the MTA that issues the DSN cannot anticipate those
   circumstances, the DSN format described here may contain both the
   original and final forms of a recipient address, and both a
   transport-independent and a transport-specific indication of delivery
   status.

   Extension fields may also be added by the Reporting MTA as needed to
   provide additional information for use in a trouble ticket or to
   preserve information for tunneling of foreign delivery reports
   through Internet DSNs.

   The Original, Reporting, and Remote MTAs may exist in very different
   environments and use dissimilar transport protocols, MTA names,
   address formats, and delivery status codes.  DSNs therefore do not
   assume any particular format for mailbox addresses, MTA names, or
   transport-specific status codes.  Instead, the various DSN fields
   that carry such quantities consist of a "type" sub-field followed by
   a sub-field whose contents are ordinary text characters, and the
   format of which is indicated by the "type" sub-field.  This allows a
   DSN to convey these quantities regardless of format.

2. Format of a Delivery Status Notification

   A DSN is a MIME message with a top-level content-type of
   multipart/report (defined in [REPORT]).  When a multipart/report
   content is used to transmit a DSN:

   (a) The report-type parameter of the multipart/report content is
       "delivery-status".

   (b) The first component of the multipart/report contains a human-
       readable explanation of the DSN, as described in [REPORT].






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   (c) The second component of the multipart/report is of content-type
       message/delivery-status, described in section 2.1 of this
       document.

   (d) If the original message or a portion of the message is to be
       returned to the sender, it appears as the third component of the
       multipart/report.

   NOTE: For delivery status notifications gatewayed from foreign
   systems, the headers of the original message may not be available.
   In this case the third component of the DSN may be omitted, or it may
   contain "simulated" RFC 822 headers that contain equivalent
   information.  In particular, it is very desirable to preserve the
   subject, date, and message-id (or equivalent) fields from the
   original message.

   The DSN MUST be addressed (in both the message header and the
   transport envelope) to the return address from the transport envelope
   which accompanied the original message for which the DSN was
   generated.  (For a message that arrived via SMTP, the envelope return
   address appears in the MAIL FROM command.)

   The From field of the message header of the DSN SHOULD contain the
   address of a human who is responsible for maintaining the mail system
   at the Reporting MTA site (e.g., Postmaster), so that a reply to the
   DSN will reach that person.  Exception: if a DSN is translated from a
   foreign delivery report, and the gateway performing the translation
   cannot determine the appropriate address, the From field of the DSN
   MAY be the address of a human who is responsible for maintaining the
   gateway.

   The envelope sender address of the DSN SHOULD be chosen to ensure
   that no delivery status reports will be issued in response to the DSN
   itself, and MUST be chosen so that DSNs will not generate mail loops.
   Whenever an SMTP transaction is used to send a DSN, the MAIL FROM
   command MUST use a NULL return address, i.e., "MAIL FROM:<>".

   A particular DSN describes the delivery status for exactly one
   message.  However, an MTA MAY report on the delivery status for
   several recipients of the same message in a single DSN.  Due to the
   nature of the mail transport system (where responsibility for
   delivery of a message to its recipients may be split among several
   MTAs, and delivery to any particular recipient may be delayed),
   multiple DSNs may still be issued in response to a single message
   submission.






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2.1 The message/delivery-status content-type

   The message/delivery-status content-type is defined as follows:

   MIME type name:             message
   MIME subtype name:          delivery-status
   Optional parameters:        none
   Encoding considerations:    "7bit" encoding is sufficient and
                               MUST be used to maintain readability
                               when viewed by non-MIME mail readers.
   Security considerations:    discussed in section 4 of this memo.

   The message/delivery-status report type for use in the
   multipart/report is "delivery-status".

   The body of a message/delivery-status consists of one or more
   "fields" formatted according to the ABNF of RFC 822 header "fields"
   (see [RFC822]).  The per-message fields appear first, followed by a
   blank line.  Following the per-message fields are one or more groups
   of per-recipient fields.  Each group of per-recipient fields is
   preceded by a blank line.  Using the ABNF of RFC 822, the syntax of
   the message/delivery-status content is as follows:

           delivery-status-content =  per-message-fields 1*
                                     ( CRLF per-recipient-fields )

   The per-message fields are described in section 2.2.  The
   per-recipient fields are described in section 2.3.

2.1.1 General conventions for DSN fields

   Since these fields are defined according to the rules of RFC 822, the
   same conventions for continuation lines and comments apply.
   Notification fields may be continued onto multiple lines by beginning
   each additional line with a SPACE or HTAB.  Text that appears in
   parentheses is considered a comment and not part of the contents of
   that notification field.  Field names are case-insensitive, so the
   names of notification fields may be spelled in any combination of
   upper and lower case letters.  Comments in DSN fields may use the
   "encoded-word" construct defined in [MIME3].

2.1.2 "*-type" sub-fields

   Several DSN fields consist of a "-type" sub-field, followed by a
   semicolon, followed by "*text".  For these fields, the keyword used
   in the address-type, diagnostic-type, or MTA-name-type sub-field
   indicates the expected format of the address, status-code, or
   MTA-name which follows.



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   The "-type" sub-fields are defined as follows:

   (a) An "address-type" specifies the format of a mailbox address.  For
       example, Internet mail addresses use the "rfc822" address-type.

               address-type = atom

   (b) A "diagnostic-type" specifies the format of a status code.  For
       example, when a DSN field contains a reply code reported via the
       Simple Mail Transfer Protocol [SMTP], the "smtp" diagnostic-type
       is used.

               diagnostic-type = atom

   (c) An "MTA-name-type" specifies the format of an MTA name.  For
       example, for an SMTP server on an Internet host, the MTA name is
       the domain name of that host, and the "dns" MTA-name-type is
       used.

               mta-name-type = atom

   Values for address-type, diagnostic-type, and MTA-name-type are
   case-insensitive.  Thus address-type values of "RFC822" and "rfc822"
   are equivalent.

   The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) will maintain a
   registry of address-types, diagnostic-types, and MTA-name-types,
   along with descriptions of the meanings and acceptable values of
   each, or a reference to one or more specifications that provide such
   descriptions.  (The "rfc822" address-type, "smtp" diagnostic-type,
   and "dns" MTA-name-type are defined in [DRPT].)  Registration forms
   for address-type, diagnostic-type, and MTA-name-type appear in
   Appendix D.

   IANA will not accept registrations for any address-type,
   diagnostic-type, or MTA-name-type name that begins with "X-".  These
   type names are reserved for experimental use.

2.1.3 Lexical tokens imported from RFC 822

   The following lexical tokens, defined in [RFC822], are used in the
   ABNF grammar for DSNs: atom, CHAR, comment, CR, CRLF, DIGIT, LF,
   linear-white-space, SPACE, text.  The date-time lexical token is
   defined in [HOSTREQ].







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2.2 Per-Message DSN Fields

   Some fields of a DSN apply to all of the delivery attempts described
   by that DSN.  At most, these fields may appear once in any DSN.
   These fields are used to correlate the DSN with the original message
   transaction and to provide additional information which may be useful
   to gateways.

          per-message-fields =
                [ original-envelope-id-field CRLF ]
                reporting-mta-field CRLF
                [ dsn-gateway-field CRLF ]
                [ received-from-mta-field CRLF ]
                [ arrival-date-field CRLF ]
                *( extension-field CRLF )

2.2.1 The Original-Envelope-Id field

   The optional Original-Envelope-Id field contains an "envelope
   identifier" that uniquely identifies the transaction during which the
   message was submitted, and was either (a) specified by the sender and
   supplied to the sender's MTA, or (b) generated by the sender's MTA
   and made available to the sender when the message was submitted.  Its
   purpose is to allow the sender (or her user agent) to associate the
   returned DSN with the specific transaction in which the message was
   sent.

   If such an envelope identifier was present in the envelope that
   accompanied the message when it arrived at the Reporting MTA, it
   SHOULD be supplied in the Original-Envelope-Id field of any DSNs
   issued as a result of an attempt to deliver the message.  Except when
   a DSN is issued by the sender's MTA, an MTA MUST NOT supply this
   field unless there is an envelope-identifier field in the envelope
   that accompanied this message on its arrival at the Reporting MTA.

   The Original-Envelope-Id field is defined as follows:

           original-envelope-id-field =
                  "Original-Envelope-Id" ":" envelope-id

            envelope-id = *text

   There may be at most one Original-Envelope-Id field per DSN.

   The envelope-id is CASE-SENSITIVE.  The DSN MUST preserve the
   original case and spelling of the envelope-id.





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         NOTE: The Original-Envelope-Id is NOT the same as the
         Message-Id from the message header.  The Message-Id identifies
         the content of the message, while the Original-Envelope-Id
         identifies the transaction in which the message is sent.

2.2.2 The Reporting-MTA DSN field

         reporting-mta-field =
               "Reporting-MTA" ":" mta-name-type ";" mta-name

          mta-name = *text

   The Reporting-MTA field is defined as follows:

   A DSN describes the results of attempts to deliver, relay, or gateway
   a message to one or more recipients.  In all cases, the Reporting-MTA
   is the MTA that attempted to perform the delivery, relay, or gateway
   operation described in the DSN.  This field is required.

   Note that if an SMTP client attempts to relay a message to an SMTP
   server and receives an error reply to a RCPT command, the client is
   responsible for generating the DSN, and the client's domain name will
   appear in the Reporting-MTA field.  (The server's domain name will
   appear in the Remote-MTA field.)

   Note that the Reporting-MTA is not necessarily the MTA which actually
   issued the DSN.  For example, if an attempt to deliver a message
   outside of the Internet resulted in a non-delivery notification which
   was gatewayed back into Internet mail, the Reporting-MTA field of the
   resulting DSN would be that of the MTA that originally reported the
   delivery failure, not that of the gateway which converted the foreign
   notification into a DSN.  See Figure 2.



















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 sender's environment                            recipient's environment
 ............................ ..........................................
                            : :
                        (1) : :                             (2)
   +-----+  +--------+  +--------+  +---------+  +---------+   +------+
   |     |  |        |  |        |  |Received-|  |         |   |      |
   |     |=>|Original|=>|        |->|  From   |->|Reporting|-->|Remote|
   | user|  |   MTA  |  |        |  |   MTA   |  |   MTA   |<No|  MTA |
   |agent|  +--------+  |Gateway |  +---------+  +----v----+   +------+
   |     |              |        |                    |
   |     | <============|        |<-------------------+
   +-----+              |        |(4)                (3)
                        +--------+
                            : :
 ...........................: :.........................................

              Figure 2. DSNs in the presence of gateways

   (1) message is gatewayed into recipient's environment
   (2) attempt to relay message fails
   (3) reporting-mta (in recipient's environment) returns non-delivery
       notification
   (4) gateway translates foreign notification into a DSN

   The mta-name portion of the Reporting-MTA field is formatted
   according to the conventions indicated by the mta-name-type
   sub-field.  If an MTA functions as a gateway between dissimilar mail
   environments and thus is known by multiple names depending on the
   environment, the mta-name sub-field SHOULD contain the name used by
   the environment from which the message was accepted by the
   Reporting-MTA.

   Because the exact spelling of an MTA name may be significant in a
   particular environment, MTA names are CASE-SENSITIVE.

2.2.3 The DSN-Gateway field

   The DSN-Gateway field indicates the name of the gateway or MTA that
   translated a foreign (non-Internet) delivery status notification into
   this DSN.  This field MUST appear in any DSN that was translated by a
   gateway from a foreign system into DSN format, and MUST NOT appear
   otherwise.

      dsn-gateway-field = "DSN-Gateway" ":" mta-name-type ";" mta-name

   For gateways into Internet mail, the MTA-name-type will normally be
   "dns", and the mta-name will be the Internet domain name of the
   gateway.



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2.2.4 The Received-From-MTA DSN field

   The optional Received-From-MTA field indicates the name of the MTA
   from which the message was received.

        received-from-mta-field =
             "Received-From-MTA" ":" mta-name-type ";" mta-name

   If the message was received from an Internet host via SMTP, the
   contents of the mta-name sub-field SHOULD be the Internet domain name
   supplied in the HELO or EHLO command, and the network address used by
   the SMTP client SHOULD be included as a comment enclosed in
   parentheses.  (In this case, the MTA-name-type will be "dns".)

   The mta-name portion of the Received-From-MTA field is formatted
   according to the conventions indicated by the MTA-name-type sub-
   field.

   Since case is significant in some mail systems, the exact spelling,
   including case, of the MTA name SHOULD be preserved.

2.2.5 The Arrival-Date DSN field

   The optional Arrival-Date field indicates the date and time at which
   the message arrived at the Reporting MTA.  If the Last-Attempt-Date
   field is also provided in a per-recipient field, this can be used to
   determine the interval between when the message arrived at the
   Reporting MTA and when the report was issued for that recipient.

        arrival-date-field = "Arrival-Date" ":" date-time

   The date and time are expressed in RFC 822 'date-time' format, as
   modified by [HOSTREQ].  Numeric timezones ([+/-]HHMM format) MUST be
   used.

2.3 Per-Recipient DSN fields

   A DSN contains information about attempts to deliver a message to one
   or more recipients.  The delivery information for any particular
   recipient is contained in a group of contiguous per-recipient fields.
   Each group of per-recipient fields is preceded by a blank line.










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   The syntax for the group of per-recipient fields is as follows:

        per-recipient-fields =
              [ original-recipient-field CRLF ]
              final-recipient-field CRLF
              action-field CRLF
              status-field CRLF
              [ remote-mta-field CRLF ]
              [ diagnostic-code-field CRLF ]
              [ last-attempt-date-field CRLF ]
              [ final-log-id-field CRLF ]
              [ will-retry-until-field CRLF ]
              *( extension-field CRLF )

2.3.1 Original-Recipient field

   The Original-Recipient field indicates the original recipient address
   as specified by the sender of the message for which the DSN is being
   issued.

       original-recipient-field =
             "Original-Recipient" ":" address-type ";" generic-address

        generic-address = *text

   The address-type field indicates the type of the original recipient
   address.  If the message originated within the Internet, the
   address-type field will normally be "rfc822", and the address will be
   according to the syntax specified in [RFC822].  The value "unknown"
   should be used if the Reporting MTA cannot determine the type of the
   original recipient address from the message envelope.

   This field is optional.  It should be included only if the sender-
   specified recipient address was present in the message envelope, such
   as by the SMTP extensions defined in [DRPT].  This address is the
   same as that provided by the sender and can be used to automatically
   correlate DSN reports and message transactions.

2.3.2 Final-Recipient field

   The Final-Recipient field indicates the recipient for which this set
   of per-recipient fields applies.  This field MUST be present in each
   set of per-recipient data.








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   The syntax of the field is as follows:

         final-recipient-field =
             "Final-Recipient" ":" address-type ";" generic-address

   The generic-address sub-field of the Final-Recipient field MUST
   contain the mailbox address of the recipient (from the transport
   envelope), as it was when the Reporting MTA accepted the message for
   delivery.

   The Final-Recipient address may differ from the address originally
   provided by the sender, because it may have been transformed during
   forwarding and gatewaying into a totally unrecognizable mess.
   However, in the absence of the optional Original-Recipient field, the
   Final-Recipient field and any returned content may be the only
   information available with which to correlate the DSN with a
   particular message submission.

   The address-type sub-field indicates the type of address expected by
   the reporting MTA in that context.  Recipient addresses obtained via
   SMTP will normally be of address-type "rfc822".

   NOTE: The Reporting MTA is not expected to ensure that the address
   actually conforms to the syntax conventions of the address-type.
   Instead, it MUST report exactly the address received in the envelope,
   unless that address contains characters such as CR or LF which are
   not allowed in a DSN field.

   Since mailbox addresses (including those used in the Internet) may be
   case sensitive, the case of alphabetic characters in the address MUST
   be preserved.

2.3.3 Action field

   The Action field indicates the action performed by the Reporting-MTA
   as a result of its attempt to deliver the message to this recipient
   address.  This field MUST be present for each recipient named in the
   DSN.

   The syntax for the action-field is:

      action-field = "Action" ":" action-value

      action-value =
            "failed" / "delayed" / "delivered" / "relayed" / "expanded"

   The action-value may be spelled in any combination of upper and lower
   case characters.



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   "failed"    indicates that the message could not be delivered to the
               recipient.  The Reporting MTA has abandoned any attempts
               to deliver the message to this recipient.  No further
               notifications should be expected.

   "delayed"   indicates that the Reporting MTA has so far been unable
               to deliver or relay the message, but it will continue to
               attempt to do so.  Additional notification messages may
               be issued as the message is further delayed or
               successfully delivered, or if delivery attempts are later
               abandoned.

   "delivered" indicates that the message was successfully delivered to
               the recipient address specified by the sender, which
               includes "delivery" to a mailing list exploder.  It does
               not indicate that the message has been read.  This is a
               terminal state and no further DSN for this recipient
               should be expected.


   "relayed"   indicates that the message has been relayed or gatewayed
               into an environment that does not accept responsibility
               for generating DSNs upon successful delivery.  This
               action-value SHOULD NOT be used unless the sender has
               requested notification of successful delivery for this
               recipient.

   "expanded"  indicates that the message has been successfully
               delivered to the recipient address as specified by the
               sender, and forwarded by the Reporting-MTA beyond that
               destination to multiple additional recipient addresses.
               An action-value of "expanded" differs from "delivered" in
               that "expanded" is not a terminal state.  Further
               "failed" and/or "delayed" notifications may be provided.

   Using the terms "mailing list" and "alias" as defined in [DRPT],
   section 7.2.7: An action-value of "expanded" is only to be used when
   the message is delivered to a multiple-recipient "alias".  An
   action-value of "expanded" SHOULD NOT be used with a DSN issued on
   delivery of a message to a "mailing list".

       NOTE ON ACTION VS. STATUS CODES: Although the 'action' field
       might seem to be redundant with the 'status' field, this is not
       the case.  In particular, a "temporary failure" ("4") status code
       could be used with an action-value of either "delayed" or
       "failed".  For example, assume that an SMTP client repeatedly
       tries to relay a message to the mail exchanger for a recipient,
       but fails because a query to a domain name server timed out.



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       After a few hours, it might issue a "delayed" DSN to inform the
       sender that the message had not yet been delivered.  After a few
       days, the MTA might abandon its attempt to deliver the message
       and return a "failed" DSN.  The status code (which would begin
       with a "4" to indicate "temporary failure") would be the same for
       both DSNs.

       Another example for which the action and status codes may appear
       contradictory: If an MTA or mail gateway cannot deliver a message
       because doing so would entail conversions resulting in an
       unacceptable loss of information, it would issue a DSN with the
       'action' field of "failure" and a status code of 'XXX'.  If the
       message had instead been relayed, but with some loss of
       information, it might generate a DSN with the same XXX status-
       code, but with an action field of "relayed".

2.3.4 Status field

   The per-recipient Status field contains a transport-independent
   status code that indicates the delivery status of the message to that
   recipient.  This field MUST be present for each delivery attempt
   which is described by a DSN.

   The syntax of the status field is:

   status-field = "Status" ":" status-code

   status-code = DIGIT "." 1*3DIGIT "." 1*3DIGIT

      ; White-space characters and comments are NOT allowed within
      ; a status-code, though a comment enclosed in parentheses
      ; MAY follow the last numeric sub-field of the status-code.
      ; Each numeric sub-field within the status-code MUST be
      ; expressed without leading zero digits.

   Status codes thus consist of three numerical fields separated by ".".
   The first sub-field indicates whether the delivery attempt was
   successful (2= success, 4 = persistent temporary failure, 5 =
   permanent failure).  The second sub-field indicates the probable
   source of any delivery anomalies, and the third sub-field denotes a
   precise error condition, if known.

   The initial set of status-codes is defined in [STATUS].








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2.3.5 Remote-MTA field

   The value associated with the Remote-MTA DSN field is a printable
   ASCII representation of the name of the "remote" MTA that reported
   delivery status to the "reporting" MTA.

      remote-mta-field = "Remote-MTA" ":" mta-name-type ";" mta-name

   NOTE: The Remote-MTA field preserves the "while talking to"
   information that was provided in some pre-existing nondelivery
   reports.

   This field is optional.  It MUST NOT be included if no remote MTA was
   involved in the attempted delivery of the message to that recipient.

2.3.6 Diagnostic-Code field

   For a "failed" or "delayed" recipient, the Diagnostic-Code DSN field
   contains the actual diagnostic code issued by the mail transport.
   Since such codes vary from one mail transport to another, the
   diagnostic-type sub-field is needed to specify which type of
   diagnostic code is represented.

    diagnostic-code-field =
          "Diagnostic-Code" ":" diagnostic-type ";" *text

   NOTE: The information in the Diagnostic-Code field may be somewhat
   redundant with that from the Status field.  The Status field is
   needed so that any DSN, regardless of origin, may be understood by
   any user agent or gateway that parses DSNs.  Since the Status code
   will sometimes be less precise than the actual transport diagnostic
   code, the Diagnostic-Code field is provided to retain the latter
   information.  Such information may be useful in a trouble ticket sent
   to the administrator of the Reporting MTA, or when tunneling foreign
   non-delivery reports through DSNs.

   If the Diagnostic Code was obtained from a Remote MTA during an
   attempt to relay the message to that MTA, the Remote-MTA field should
   be present.  When interpreting a DSN, the presence of a Remote-MTA
   field indicates that the Diagnostic Code was issued by the Remote
   MTA.  The absence of a Remote-MTA indicates that the Diagnostic Code
   was issued by the Reporting MTA.

   In addition to the Diagnostic-Code itself, additional textual
   description of the diagnostic, MAY appear in a comment enclosed in
   parentheses.





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   This field is optional, because some mail systems supply no
   additional information beyond that which is returned in the 'action'
   and 'status' fields.  However, this field SHOULD be included if
   transport-specific diagnostic information is available.

2.3.7 Last-Attempt-Date field

   The Last-Attempt-Date field gives the date and time of the last
   attempt to relay, gateway, or deliver the message (whether successful
   or unsuccessful) by the Reporting MTA.  This is not necessarily the
   same as the value of the Date field from the header of the message
   used to transmit this delivery status notification: In cases where
   the DSN was generated by a gateway, the Date field in the message
   header contains the time the DSN was sent by the gateway and the DSN
   Last-Attempt-Date field contains the time the last delivery attempt
   occurred.

      last-attempt-date-field = "Last-Attempt-Date" ":" date-time

   This field is optional.  It MUST NOT be included if the actual date
   and time of the last delivery attempt are not available (which might
   be the case if the DSN were being issued by a gateway).

   The date and time are expressed in RFC 822 'date-time' format, as
   modified by [HOSTREQ].  Numeric timezones ([+/-]HHMM format) MUST be
   used.

2.3.8 final-log-id field

   The "final-log-id" field gives the final-log-id of the message that
   was used by the final-mta.  This can be useful as an index to the
   final-mta's log entry for that delivery attempt.

      final-log-id-field = "Final-Log-ID" ":" *text

   This field is optional.

2.3.9 Will-Retry-Until field

   For DSNs of type "delayed", the Will-Retry-Until field gives the date
   after which the Reporting MTA expects to abandon all attempts to
   deliver the message to that recipient.  The Will-Retry-Until field is
   optional for "delay" DSNs, and MUST NOT appear in other DSNs.

      will-retry-until-field = "Will-Retry-Until" ":" date-time






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   The date and time are expressed in RFC 822 'date-time' format, as
   modified by [HOSTREQ].  Numeric timezones ([+/-]HHMM format) MUST be
   used.

2.4 Extension fields

   Additional per-message or per-recipient DSN fields may be defined in
   the future by later revisions or extensions to this specification.
   Extension-field names beginning with "X-" will never be defined as
   standard fields;  such names are reserved for experimental use.  DSN
   field names NOT beginning with "X-" MUST be registered with the
   Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) and published in an RFC.

   Extension DSN fields may be defined for the following reasons:

   (a) To allow additional information from foreign delivery status
       reports to be tunneled through Internet DSNs.  The names of such
       DSN fields should begin with an indication of the foreign
       environment name (e.g., X400-Physical-Forwarding-Address).

   (b) To allow the transmission of diagnostic information which is
       specific to a particular mail transport protocol.  The names of
       such DSN fields should begin with an indication of the mail
       transport being used (e.g., SMTP-Remote-Recipient-Address).  Such
       fields should be used for diagnostic purposes only and not by
       user agents or mail gateways.

   (c) To allow transmission of diagnostic information which is specific
       to a particular message transfer agent (MTA).  The names of such
       DSN fields should begin with an indication of the MTA
       implementation that produced the DSN. (e.g., Foomail-Queue-ID).

   MTA implementers are encouraged to provide adequate information, via
   extension fields if necessary, to allow an MTA maintainer to
   understand the nature of correctable delivery failures and how to fix
   them.  For example, if message delivery attempts are logged, the DSN
   might include information that allows the MTA maintainer to easily
   find the log entry for a failed delivery attempt.

   If an MTA developer does not wish to register the meanings of such
   extension fields, "X-" fields may be used for this purpose.  To avoid
   name collisions, the name of the MTA implementation should follow the
   "X-", (e.g., "X-Foomail-Log-ID").








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3. Conformance and Usage Requirements

   An MTA or gateway conforms to this specification if it generates DSNs
   according to the protocol defined in this memo.  For MTAs and
   gateways that do not support requests for positive delivery
   notification (such as in [DRPT]), it is sufficient that delivery
   failure reports use this protocol.

   A minimal implementation of this specification need generate only the
   Reporting-MTA per-message field, and the Final-Recipient, Action, and
   Status fields for each attempt to deliver a message to a recipient
   described by the DSN.  Generation of the other fields, when
   appropriate, is strongly recommended.

   MTAs and gateways MUST NOT generate the Original-Recipient field of a
   DSN unless the mail transfer protocol provides the address originally
   specified by the sender at the time of submission.  (Ordinary SMTP
   does not make that guarantee, but the SMTP extension defined in
   [DRPT] permits such information to be carried in the envelope if it
   is available.)

   Each sender-specified recipient address SHOULD result in at most one
   "delivered" or "failed" DSN for that recipient.  If a positive DSN is
   requested (e.g., one using NOTIFY=SUCCESS in SMTP) for a recipient
   that is forwarded to multiple recipients of an "alias" (as defined in
   [DRPT], section 7.2.7), the forwarding MTA SHOULD normally issue a
   "expanded" DSN for the originally-specified recipient and not
   propagate the request for a DSN to the forwarding addresses.
   Alternatively, the forwarding MTA MAY relay the request for a DSN to
   exactly one of the forwarding addresses and not propagate the request
   to the others.

   By contrast, successful submission of a message to a mailing list
   exploder is considered final delivery of the message.  Upon delivery
   of a message to a recipient address corresponding to a mailing list
   exploder, the Reporting MTA SHOULD issue an appropriate DSN exactly
   as if the recipient address were that of an ordinary mailbox.

       NOTE: This is actually intended to make DSNs usable by mailing
       lists themselves.  Any message sent to a mailing list subscriber
       should have its envelope return address pointing to the list
       maintainer [see RFC 1123, section 5.3.7(E)].  Since DSNs are sent
       to the envelope return address, all DSNs resulting from delivery
       to the recipients of a mailing list will be sent to the list
       maintainer.  The list maintainer may elect to mechanically
       process DSNs upon receipt, and thus automatically delete invalid
       addresses from the list. (See section 7 of this memo.)




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   This specification places no restrictions on the processing of DSNs
   received by user agents or distribution lists.

4. Security Considerations

   The following security considerations apply when using DSNs:

4.1 Forgery

   DSNs may be forged as easily as ordinary Internet electronic mail.
   User agents and automatic mail handling facilities (such as mail
   distribution list exploders) that wish to make automatic use of DSNs
   should take appropriate precautions to minimize the potential damage
   from denial-of-service attacks.

   Security threats related to forged DSNs include the sending of:

   (a) A falsified delivery notification when the message is not
       delivered to the indicated recipient,

   (b) A falsified non-delivery notification when the message was in
       fact delivered to the indicated recipient,

   (c) A falsified Final-Recipient address,

   (d) A falsified Remote-MTA identification,

   (e) A falsified relay notification when the message is "dead ended".

   (f) Unsolicited DSNs

4.2 Confidentiality

   Another dimension of security is confidentiality.  There may be cases
   in which a message recipient is autoforwarding messages but does not
   wish to divulge the address to which the messages are autoforwarded.
   The desire for such confidentiality will probably be heightened as
   "wireless mailboxes", such as pagers, become more widely used as
   autoforward addresses.

   MTA authors are encouraged to provide a mechanism which enables the
   end user to preserve the confidentiality of a forwarding address.
   Depending on the degree of confidentiality required, and the nature
   of the environment to which a message were being forwarded, this
   might be accomplished by one or more of:






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   (a) issuing a "relayed" DSN (if a positive DSN was requested) when a
       message is forwarded to a confidential forwarding address, and
       disabling requests for positive DSNs for the forwarded message,

   (b) declaring the message to be delivered, issuing a "delivered" DSN,
       re-sending the message to the confidential forwarding address,
       and arranging for no DSNs to be issued for the re-sent message,

   (c) omitting "Remote-*" or extension fields of a DSN whenever they
       would otherwise contain confidential information (such as a
       confidential forwarding address),

   (d) for messages forwarded to a confidential address, setting the
       envelope return address (e.g., SMTP MAIL FROM address) to the
       NULL reverse-path ("<>") (so that no DSNs would be sent from a
       downstream MTA to the original sender),

   (e) for messages forwarded to a confidential address, disabling
       delivery notifications for the forwarded message (e.g., if the
       "next-hop" MTA uses ESMTP and supports the DSN extension, by
       using the NOTIFY=NEVER parameter to the RCPT command), or

   (f) when forwarding mail to a confidential address, having the
       forwarding MTA rewrite the envelope return address for the
       forwarded message and attempt delivery of that message as if the
       forwarding MTA were the originator.  On its receipt of final
       delivery status, the forwarding MTA would issue a DSN to the
       original sender.

   In general, any optional DSN field may be omitted if the Reporting
   MTA site determines that inclusion of the field would impose too
   great a compromise of site confidentiality.  The need for such
   confidentiality must be balanced against the utility of the omitted
   information in trouble reports and DSNs gatewayed to foreign
   environments.

   Implementers are cautioned that many existing MTAs will send non-
   delivery notifications to a return address in the message header
   (rather than to the one in the envelope), in violation of SMTP and
   other protocols.  If a message is forwarded through such an MTA, no
   reasonable action on the part of the forwarding MTA will prevent the
   downstream MTA from compromising the forwarding address.  Likewise,
   if the recipient's MTA automatically responds to messages based on a
   request in the message header (such as the nonstandard, but widely
   used, Return-Receipt-To extension header), it will also compromise
   the forwarding address.





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4.3 Non-Repudiation

   Within the framework of today's internet mail, the DSNs defined in
   this memo provide valuable information to the mail user; however,
   even a "failed" DSN can not be relied upon as a guarantee that a
   message was not received by the recipient.  Even if DSNs are not
   actively forged, conditions exist under which a message can be
   delivered despite the fact that a failure DSN was issued.

   For example, a race condition in the SMTP protocol allows for the
   duplication of messages if the connection is dropped following a
   completed DATA command, but before a response is seen by the SMTP
   client.

   This will cause the SMTP client to retransmit the message, even
   though the SMTP server has already accepted it [SMTPDUP].  If one of
   those delivery attempts succeeds and the other one fails, a "failed"
   DSN could be issued even though the message actually reached the
   recipient.

5. Normative References

   [DRPT]    Moore, K., "SMTP Service Extension for Delivery Status
             Notifications", RFC 3461, January 2003.

   [DSN]     Moore, K. and G. Vaudreuil, "An Extensible Message Format
             for Delivery Status Notifications", RFC 1894, January 1996.

   [HOSTREQ] Braden, R. (ed.), "Requirements for Internet Hosts -
             Application and Support", STD 3, RFC 1123, October 1989.

   [MIME1]   Freed, N. and N. Borenstein, "Multipurpose Internet Mail
             Extensions (MIME) Part One: Format of Internet Message
             Bodies", RFC 2045, November 1996.

   [MIME3]   Moore, K., "MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)
             Part Three: Message Header Extensions for Non-ASCII Text",
             RFC 2047, November 1996.

   [REPORT]  Vaudreuil, G., "The Multipart/Report Content Type for the
             Reporting of Mail System Administrative Messages", RFC
             3462, January 2003.

   [RFC822]  Crocker, D., "Standard for the format of ARPA Internet Text
             Messages", STD 11, RFC 822, August 1982.

   [SMTP]    Postel, J., "Simple Mail Transfer Protocol", STD 10, RFC
             821, August 1982.



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   [SMTPDUP] Partridge, C., "Duplicate Messages and SMTP", RFC 1047,
             February 1988.

   [STATUS]  Vaudreuil, G., "Enhanced Mail System Status Codes", RFC
             3463, January 2003.

   [RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
             Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.

6. Acknowledgments

   The authors wish to thank the following people for their reviews of
   early drafts of RFC 1894, of which this document is a revision, and
   their suggestions for improvement:  Eric Allman, Harald Alvestrand,
   Allan Cargille, Jim Conklin, Peter Cowen, Dave Crocker, Roger Fajman,
   Ned Freed, Marko Kaittola, Steve Kille, John Klensin, John Gardiner
   Myers, Mark Nahabedian, Julian Onions, Jacob Palme, Jean Charles Roy,
   and Gregory Sheehan.

































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Appendix A - collected grammar

   NOTE: The following lexical tokens are defined in RFC 822: atom,
   CHAR, comment, CR, CRLF, DIGIT, LF, linear-white-space, SPACE, text.
   The date-time lexical token is defined in [HOSTREQ].

      action-field = "Action" ":" action-value

      action-value =  "failed" / "delayed" / "delivered"
            / "relayed" / "expanded"

      address-type = atom

      arrival-date-field = "Arrival-Date" ":" date-time

      delivery-status-content =  per-message-fields
            1*( CRLF per-recipient-fields )

      diagnostic-code-field =  "Diagnostic-Code" ":"
            diagnostic-type ";" *text

      diagnostic-type = atom

      dsn-gateway-field = "DSN-Gateway" ":" mta-name-type ";" mta-name

      envelope-id = *text

      extension-field = extension-field-name ":" *text

      extension-field-name = atom

      final-recipient-field =
            "Final-Recipient" ":" address-type ";" generic-address

      final-log-id-field = "Final-Log-ID" ":" *text

      generic-address = *text

      last-attempt-date-field = "Last-Attempt-Date" ":" date-time

      mta-name = *text

      mta-name-type = atom

      original-envelope-id-field =
            "Original-Envelope-Id" ":" envelope-id





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      original-recipient-field =
            "Original-Recipient" ":" address-type ";" generic-address

      per-message-fields =
            [ original-envelope-id-field CRLF ]
            reporting-mta-field CRLF
            [ dsn-gateway-field CRLF ]
            [ received-from-mta-field CRLF ]
            [ arrival-date-field CRLF ]
            *( extension-field CRLF )

      per-recipient-fields =
           [ original-recipient-field CRLF ]
           final-recipient-field CRLF
           action-field CRLF
           status-field CRLF
           [ remote-mta-field CRLF ]
           [ diagnostic-code-field CRLF ]
           [ last-attempt-date-field CRLF ]
           [ final-log-id-field CRLF ]
           [ will-retry-until-field CRLF ]
            *( extension-field CRLF )

      received-from-mta-field =
           "Received-From-MTA" ":" mta-name-type ";" mta-name

      remote-mta-field =
           "Remote-MTA" ":" mta-name-type ";" mta-name

      reporting-mta-field =
            "Reporting-MTA" ":" mta-name-type ";" mta-name

      status-code = DIGIT "." 1*3DIGIT "." 1*3DIGIT

        ; White-space characters and comments are NOT allowed within a
        ; a status-code, though a comment enclosed in parentheses
        ; MAY follow the last numeric sub-field of the status-code.
        ; Each numeric sub-field within the status-code MUST be
        ; expressed without leading zero digits.

      status-field = "Status" ":" status-code

      will-retry-until-field = "Will-Retry-Until" ":" date-time








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Appendix B - Guidelines for gatewaying DSNs

   NOTE: This section provides non-binding recommendations for the
   construction of mail gateways that wish to provide semi-transparent
   delivery reports between the Internet and another electronic mail
   system.  Specific DSN gateway requirements for a particular pair of
   mail systems may be defined by other documents.

Gatewaying from other mail systems to DSNs

   A mail gateway may issue a DSN to convey the contents of a "foreign"
   delivery or non-delivery notification over Internet mail.  When there
   are appropriate mappings from the foreign notification elements to
   DSN fields, the information may be transmitted in those DSN fields.
   Additional information (such as might be useful in a trouble ticket
   or needed to tunnel the foreign notification through the Internet)
   may be defined in extension DSN fields. (Such fields should be given
   names that identify the foreign mail protocol, e.g., X400-* for X.400
   NDN or DN protocol elements)

   The gateway must attempt to supply reasonable values for the
   Reporting-MTA, Final-Recipient, Action, and Status fields.  These
   will normally be obtained by translating the values from the remote
   delivery or non-delivery notification into their Internet-style
   equivalents.  However, some loss of information is to be expected.
   For example, the set of status-codes defined for DSNs may not be
   adequate to fully convey the delivery diagnostic code from the
   foreign system.  The gateway should assign the most precise code
   which describes the failure condition, falling back on "generic"
   codes such as 2.0.0 (success), 4.0.0 (temporary failure), and 5.0.0
   (permanent failure) when necessary.  The actual foreign diagnostic
   code should be retained in the Diagnostic-Code field (with an
   appropriate diagnostic-type value) for use in trouble tickets or
   tunneling.

   The sender-specified recipient address, and the original envelope-id,
   if present in the foreign transport envelope, should be preserved in
   the Original-Recipient and Original-Envelope-ID fields.

   The gateway should also attempt to preserve the "final" recipient
   addresses and MTA names from the foreign system.  Whenever possible,
   foreign protocol elements should be encoded as meaningful printable
   ASCII strings.

   For DSNs produced from foreign delivery or nondelivery notifications,
   the name of the gateway MUST appear in the DSN-Gateway field of the
   DSN.




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Gatewaying from DSNs to other mail systems

   It may be possible to gateway DSNs from the Internet into a foreign
   mail system.  The primary purpose of such gatewaying is to convey
   delivery status information in a form that is usable by the
   destination system.  A secondary purpose is to allow "tunneling" of
   DSNs through foreign mail systems, in case the DSN may be gatewayed
   back into the Internet.

   In general, the recipient of the DSN (i.e., the sender of the
   original message) will want to know, for each recipient: the closest
   available approximation to the original recipient address, the
   delivery status (success, failure, or temporary failure), and for
   failed deliveries, a diagnostic code that describes the reason for
   the failure.

   If possible, the gateway should attempt to preserve the Original-
   Recipient address and Original-Envelope-ID (if present), in the
   resulting foreign delivery status report.

   When reporting delivery failures, if the diagnostic-type sub-field of
   the Diagnostic-Code field indicates that the original diagnostic code
   is understood by the destination environment, the information from
   the Diagnostic-Code field should be used.  Failing that, the
   information in the Status field should be mapped into the closest
   available diagnostic code used in the destination environment.

   If it is possible to tunnel a DSN through the destination
   environment, the gateway specification may define a means of
   preserving the DSN information in the delivery status reports used by
   that environment.

Appendix C - Guidelines for use of DSNs by mailing list exploders

   This section pertains only to the use of DSNs by "mailing lists" as
   defined in [4], section 7.2.7.

   DSNs are designed to be used by mailing list exploders to allow them
   to detect and automatically delete recipients for whom mail delivery
   fails repeatedly.

   When forwarding a message to list subscribers, the mailing list
   exploder should always set the envelope return address (e.g., SMTP
   MAIL FROM address) to point to a special address which is set up to
   receive non-delivery reports.  A "smart" mailing list exploder can
   therefore intercept such non-delivery reports, and if they are in the
   DSN format, automatically examine them to determine for which
   recipients a message delivery failed or was delayed.



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   The Original-Recipient field should be used if available, since it
   should exactly match the subscriber address known to the list.  If
   the Original-Recipient field is not available, the recipient field
   may resemble the list subscriber address.  Often, however, the list
   subscriber will have forwarded his mail to a different address, or
   the address may be subject to some re-writing, so heuristics may be
   required to successfully match an address from the recipient field.
   Care is needed in this case to minimize the possibility of false
   matches.

   The reason for delivery failure can be obtained from the Status and
   Action fields, and from the Diagnostic-Code field (if the status-type
   is recognized).  Reports for recipients with action values other than
   "failed" can generally be ignored; in particular, subscribers should
   not be removed from a list due to "delayed" reports.

   In general, almost any failure status code (even a "permanent" one)
   can result from a temporary condition.  It is therefore recommended
   that a list exploder not delete a subscriber based on any single
   failure DSN (regardless of the status code), but only on the
   persistence of delivery failure over a period of time.

   However, some kinds of failures are less likely than others to have
   been caused by temporary conditions, and some kinds of failures are
   more likely to be noticed and corrected quickly than others.  Once
   more precise status codes are defined, it may be useful to
   differentiate between the status codes when deciding whether to
   delete a subscriber.  For example, on a list with a high message
   volume, it might be desirable to temporarily suspend delivery to a
   recipient address which causes repeated "temporary" failures, rather
   than simply deleting the recipient.  The duration of the suspension
   might depend on the type of error.  On the other hand, a "user
   unknown" error that persisted for several days could be considered a
   reliable indication that address were no longer valid.

Appendix D - IANA registration forms for DSN types

   The forms below are for use when registering a new address-type,
   diagnostic-type, or MTA-name-type with the Internet Assigned Numbers
   Authority (IANA).  Each piece of information requested by a
   registration form may be satisfied either by providing the
   information on the form itself, or by including a reference to a
   published, publicly available specification which includes the
   necessary information.  IANA MAY reject DSN type registrations
   because of incomplete registration forms, imprecise specifications,
   or inappropriate type names.





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   To register a DSN type, complete the applicable form below and send
   it via Internet electronic mail to <IANA@IANA.ORG>.

IANA registration form for address-type

   A registration for a DSN address-type MUST include the following
   information:

   (a) The proposed address-type name.

   (b) The syntax for mailbox addresses of this type, specified using
       BNF, regular expressions, ASN.1, or other non-ambiguous language.

   (c) If addresses of this type are not composed entirely of graphic
       characters from the US-ASCII repertoire, a specification for how
       they are to be encoded as graphic US-ASCII characters in a DSN
       Original-Recipient or Final-Recipient DSN field.

   (d) [optional] A specification for how addresses of this type are to
       be translated to and from Internet electronic mail addresses.

IANA registration form for diagnostic-type

   A registration for a DSN address-type MUST include the following
   information:

   (a) The proposed diagnostic-type name.

   (b) A description of the syntax to be used for expressing diagnostic
       codes of this type as graphic characters from the US-ASCII
       repertoire.

   (c) A list of valid diagnostic codes of this type and the meaning of
       each code.

   (d) [optional] A specification for mapping from diagnostic codes of
       this type to DSN status codes (as defined in [5]).

IANA registration form for MTA-name-type

   A registration for a DSN MTA-name-type must include the following
   information:

   (a) The proposed MTA-name-type name.

   (b) A description of the syntax of MTA names of this type, using BNF,
       regular expressions, ASN.1, or other non-ambiguous language.




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   (c) If MTA names of this type do not consist entirely of graphic
       characters from the US-ASCII repertoire, a specification for how
       an MTA name of this type should be expressed as a sequence of
       graphic US-ASCII characters.

Appendix E - Examples

   These examples are provided as illustration only, and are not
   considered part of the DSN protocol specification.  If an example
   conflicts with the protocol definition above, the example is wrong.

   Likewise, the use of *-type sub-field names or extension fields in
   these examples is not to be construed as a definition for those type
   names or extension fields.

   These examples were manually translated from bounced messages using
   whatever information was available.


































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Simple DSN

   This is a simple DSN issued after repeated attempts to deliver a
   message failed.  In this case, the DSN is issued by the same MTA from
   which the message was originated.

   Date: Thu, 7 Jul 1994 17:16:05 -0400 From: Mail Delivery Subsystem
   <MAILER-DAEMON@CS.UTK.EDU> Message-Id:
   <199407072116.RAA14128@CS.UTK.EDU> Subject: Returned mail: Cannot
   send message for 5 days To: <owner-info-mime@cs.utk.edu> MIME-
   Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/report; report-type=delivery-
   status;
          boundary="RAA14128.773615765/CS.UTK.EDU"

   --RAA14128.773615765/CS.UTK.EDU

   The original message was received at Sat, 2 Jul 1994 17:10:28 -0400
   from root@localhost

       ----- The following addresses had delivery problems -----
   <louisl@larry.slip.umd.edu>  (unrecoverable error)

   ----- Transcript of session follows -----
   <louisl@larry.slip.umd.edu>... Deferred: Connection timed out
               with larry.slip.umd.edu.
   Message could not be delivered for 5 days
   Message will be deleted from queue

   --RAA14128.773615765/CS.UTK.EDU
   content-type: message/delivery-status

   Reporting-MTA: dns; cs.utk.edu

   Original-Recipient: rfc822;louisl@larry.slip.umd.edu
   Final-Recipient: rfc822;louisl@larry.slip.umd.edu
   Action: failed
   Status: 4.0.0
   Diagnostic-Code: smtp; 426 connection timed out
   Last-Attempt-Date: Thu, 7 Jul 1994 17:15:49 -0400

   --RAA14128.773615765/CS.UTK.EDU
   content-type: message/rfc822

   [original message goes here]

   --RAA14128.773615765/CS.UTK.EDU--





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Multi-Recipient DSN

   This is another DSN issued by the sender's MTA, which contains
   details of multiple delivery attempts.  Some of these were detected
   locally, and others by a remote MTA.

   Date: Fri, 8 Jul 1994 09:21:47 -0400
   From: Mail Delivery Subsystem <MAILER-DAEMON@CS.UTK.EDU>
   Subject: Returned mail: User unknown
   To: <owner-ups-mib@CS.UTK.EDU>
   MIME-Version: 1.0
   Content-Type: multipart/report; report-type=delivery-status;
          boundary="JAA13167.773673707/CS.UTK.EDU"

   --JAA13167.773673707/CS.UTK.EDU
   content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

          ----- The following addresses had delivery problems -----
   <arathib@vnet.ibm.com> (unrecoverable error)
   <wsnell@sdcc13.ucsd.edu> (unrecoverable error)

    --JAA13167.773673707/CS.UTK.EDU
   content-type: message/delivery-status

   Reporting-MTA: dns; cs.utk.edu

   Original-Recipient: rfc822;arathib@vnet.ibm.com
   Final-Recipient: rfc822;arathib@vnet.ibm.com
   Action: failed
   Status: 5.0.0 (permanent failure)
   Diagnostic-Code: smtp;  550 'arathib@vnet.IBM.COM' is not a
    registered gateway user
   Remote-MTA: dns; vnet.ibm.com

   Original-Recipient: rfc822;johnh@hpnjld.njd.hp.com
   Final-Recipient: rfc822;johnh@hpnjld.njd.hp.com
   Action: delayed
   Status: 4.0.0 (hpnjld.njd.jp.com: host name lookup failure)

   Original-Recipient: rfc822;wsnell@sdcc13.ucsd.edu
   Final-Recipient: rfc822;wsnell@sdcc13.ucsd.edu
   Action: failed
   Status: 5.0.0
   Diagnostic-Code: smtp; 550 user unknown
   Remote-MTA: dns; sdcc13.ucsd.edu

   --JAA13167.773673707/CS.UTK.EDU
   content-type: message/rfc822



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    [original message goes here]

   --JAA13167.773673707/CS.UTK.EDU--

DSN from gateway to foreign system

   A delivery report generated by Message Router (MAILBUS) and gatewayed
   by PMDF_MR to a DSN.  In this case the gateway did not have
   sufficient information to supply an original-recipient address.

   Disclose-recipients: prohibited
   Date: Fri, 08 Jul 1994 09:21:25 -0400 (EDT)
   From: Message Router Submission Agent <AMMGR@corp.timeplex.com>
   Subject: Status of: Re: Battery current sense
   To: owner-ups-mib@CS.UTK.EDU
   Message-id: <01HEGJ0WNBY28Y95LN@mr.timeplex.com>
   MIME-version: 1.0
   content-type: multipart/report;
       report-type=delivery-status;
       boundary="84229080704991.122306.SYS30"

   --84229080704991.122306.SYS30
   content-type: text/plain

   Invalid address - nair_s
   %DIR-E-NODIRMTCH, No matching Directory Entry
   Entry found

   --84229080704991.122306.SYS30
   content-type: message/delivery-status

   Reporting-MTA: mailbus; SYS30

   Final-Recipient: unknown; nair_s
   Status: 5.0.0 (unknown permanent failure)
   Action: failed

   --84229080704991.122306.SYS30--













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Delayed DSN

   A delay report from a multiprotocol MTA.  Note that there is no
   returned content, so no third body part appears in the DSN.

   MIME-Version: 1.0
   From: <postmaster@nsfnet-relay.ac.uk>
   Message-Id: <199407092338.TAA23293@CS.UTK.EDU>
   Received: from nsfnet-relay.ac.uk by sun2.nsfnet-relay.ac.uk
           id <g.12954-0@sun2.nsfnet-relay.ac.uk>;
           Sun, 10 Jul 1994 00:36:51 +0100
   To: owner-info-mime@cs.utk.edu
   Date: Sun, 10 Jul 1994 00:36:51 +0100
   Subject: WARNING: message delayed at "nsfnet-relay.ac.uk"
   content-type: multipart/report; report-type=delivery-status;
          boundary=foobar

   --foobar
   content-type: text/plain

   The following message:

   UA-ID: Reliable PC (...
   Q-ID: sun2.nsf:77/msg.11820-0

   has not been delivered to the intended recipient:

       thomas@de-montfort.ac.uk

   despite repeated delivery attempts over the past 24 hours.

   The usual cause of this problem is that the remote system is
   temporarily unavailable.

   Delivery will continue to be attempted up to a total elapsed time of
   168 hours, i.e., 7 days.

   You will be informed if delivery proves to be impossible within this
   time.

   Please quote the Q-ID in any queries regarding this mail.

   --foobar
   content-type: message/delivery-status

   Reporting-MTA: dns; sun2.nsfnet-relay.ac.uk

   Final-Recipient: rfc822;thomas@de-montfort.ac.uk



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   Status: 4.0.0 (unknown temporary failure)
   Action: delayed

   --foobar--

Appendix F - Changes from RFC 1894

   Changed Authors contact information

   Updated required standards boilerplate

   Edited the text to make it spell-checker and grammar checker
   compliant

   Updated references to point to later, more mature documents, changed
   reference enumeration scheme.

   Fixed paragraph numbering on page 20

   Fixed Delayed DSN example

   Added Table of Contents

   Moved Appendices to the end of the document

   Changed the MTA-name-Type for gateways into Internet mail, the
   MTA-name-type from "SMTP" to "dns".
























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Authors' Addresses

   Keith Moore
   University of Tennessee
   1122 Volunteer Blvd, Suite 203
   Knoxville TN 37996-3450
   USA

   Phone: +1-865-974-3126
   Fax:   +1-865-974-8296
   EMail: moore@cs.utk.edu


   Gregory M. Vaudreuil
   Lucent Technologies
   7291 Williamson Rd
   Dallas, Tx. 75214
   USA

   Phone: +1 214 823 9325
   EMail: GregV@ieee.org






























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Full Copyright Statement

   Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2003).  All Rights Reserved.

   This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to
   others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it
   or assist in its implementation may be prepared, copied, published
   and distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any
   kind, provided that the above copyright notice and this paragraph are
   included on all such copies and derivative works.  However, this
   document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing
   the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other
   Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of
   developing Internet standards in which case the procedures for
   copyrights defined in the Internet Standards process must be
   followed, or as required to translate it into languages other than
   English.

   The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be
   revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns.

   This document and the information contained herein is provided on an
   "AS IS" basis and THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING
   TASK FORCE DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING
   BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION
   HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
   MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

Acknowledgement

   Funding for the RFC Editor function is currently provided by the
   Internet Society.



















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