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Gmail having issues

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Re: Gmail having issues

#201

Just got this from the ProtonMail team: > Dear ProtonMail user, Starting at around 4:30PM New York (10:30PM Zurich), Gmail suffered a global outage. A catastrophic failure at Gmail is causing emails sent to Gmail to permanently fail and bounce back. The error message from Gmail is the following: 550-5.1.1 The email account that you tried to reach does not exist. This is a global issue, and it impacts all email provid…

This feels like a cheap shot at Google. Shit happens, and they're not immune to it even if the servers are located in Zurich. Running a datacenter is no easy task.

Being down is okay. Returning an error message that results in the data being thrown away instead of being requeued is not. Block incoming smtp connections until your app layer is fixed.

Re: Gmail having issues

#202

Just got this from the ProtonMail team: > Dear ProtonMail user, Starting at around 4:30PM New York (10:30PM Zurich), Gmail suffered a global outage. A catastrophic failure at Gmail is causing emails sent to Gmail to permanently fail and bounce back. The error message from Gmail is the following: 550-5.1.1 The email account that you tried to reach does not exist. This is a global issue, and it impacts all email provid…

Confirmed likewise.

Re: Gmail having issues

#203
post #196
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, there was a very similar event yesterday, approx. 22 hours ago: https://www.google.com/appsstatus#hl=en&v=issue&sid=1&iid=10...

When that happened I panicked a little, realizing how much Google Sheets data I had that wasn't really backed up anywhere since Sheets files in Google Drive are basically just links. I started a Takeout, but it looks like I wasn't the only one - it took well over a day to complete.

Be sure to verify that it worked. Some settings of Takeout don’t download docs/sheets/slides files. I don’t remember what the default is, unfortunately.

Re: Gmail having issues

#204

Just got this from the ProtonMail team: > Dear ProtonMail user, Starting at around 4:30PM New York (10:30PM Zurich), Gmail suffered a global outage. A catastrophic failure at Gmail is causing emails sent to Gmail to permanently fail and bounce back. The error message from Gmail is the following: 550-5.1.1 The email account that you tried to reach does not exist. This is a global issue, and it impacts all email provid…

This feels like a cheap shot at Google. Shit happens, and they're not immune to it even if the servers are located in Zurich. Running a datacenter is no easy task.

I see it as Protonmail explaining to their users that the failure is not on their end and why they can't do much about a remedy. Seems purely factual. A cheap shot would be generalizing from the event, but I don't see them doing that.

Re: Gmail having issues

#205

Just got this from the ProtonMail team: > Dear ProtonMail user, Starting at around 4:30PM New York (10:30PM Zurich), Gmail suffered a global outage. A catastrophic failure at Gmail is causing emails sent to Gmail to permanently fail and bounce back. The error message from Gmail is the following: 550-5.1.1 The email account that you tried to reach does not exist. This is a global issue, and it impacts all email provid…

This feels like a cheap shot at Google. Shit happens, and they're not immune to it even if the servers are located in Zurich. Running a datacenter is no easy task.

A lot of people and companies use Gmail. Email providers are definitely getting support requests from users that don't know what's going on.

This is not a cheap shot, but a message to inform users that it's an issue with Google that Protonmail can do nothing about.

Re: Gmail having issues

#206
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can they call someone when there is an issue with gmail? Is there a contract that give them some leverage and guaranties? What is the process in the case of a missing business-critical email being lost and needing recovery? For business critical operation, leave such answers unanswered can be pretty risky.

Yes, Gsuite has a SLA and telephone support etc.

Now would be an excellent time to ask people who use gmail for business critical operation how well that SLA and telephone support work in practice.

I know for example companies that use email for handling customer orders at their stores. I can just imagine the loss if the system was down for hours a few days before Christmas, or worse, actually lost the data.

Re: Gmail having issues

#207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This feels like a cheap shot at Google. Shit happens, and they're not immune to it even if the servers are located in Zurich. Running a datacenter is no easy task.

Being down is okay. Returning an error message that results in the data being thrown away instead of being requeued is not. Block incoming smtp connections until your app layer is fixed.

Yeah, this is a particularly pernicious failure given how email works. Many mailing providers will just mark these as blacklisted, now, and lots of unsophisticated users likely won't notice.

Re: Gmail having issues

#208

Just got this from the ProtonMail team: > Dear ProtonMail user, Starting at around 4:30PM New York (10:30PM Zurich), Gmail suffered a global outage. A catastrophic failure at Gmail is causing emails sent to Gmail to permanently fail and bounce back. The error message from Gmail is the following: 550-5.1.1 The email account that you tried to reach does not exist. This is a global issue, and it impacts all email provid…

This feels like a cheap shot at Google. Shit happens, and they're not immune to it even if the servers are located in Zurich. Running a datacenter is no easy task.

More like "if mail to gmail fails it's not us so pleas don't flood the support with comaplains".

> Running a datacenter is no easy task.

Sure, but then there are very view companies which have more experience with running data-centers and (normally) providing reliable email service.

So any outage for more then just a short time is very unusual. I'm really interested what went wrong.

Re: Gmail having issues

#209

Just got this from the ProtonMail team: > Dear ProtonMail user, Starting at around 4:30PM New York (10:30PM Zurich), Gmail suffered a global outage. A catastrophic failure at Gmail is causing emails sent to Gmail to permanently fail and bounce back. The error message from Gmail is the following: 550-5.1.1 The email account that you tried to reach does not exist. This is a global issue, and it impacts all email provid…

This is the Nightmare Scenario for mailing lists.

Many of them auto-unsubscribe after a bounce.

Re: Gmail having issues

#210
post #41
post #20

Over the past 24 hours, I've had GitHub request that I re-verify my gmail three times (roughly 22 hours ago, 2 hours ago, and now), each time resetting my primary email's status to "Undeliverable" and "Unverified" The triggering event may be an email bounce. I get a lot of github notifications sent to my email, and the failure of just one/a few may trigger the reverification.

This is another good reason to have email @yourowndomain.tld When this happens, you can spin up a temporary server and have a mechanism in place to redirect email so you don't go down when your provider does.

Except as an academic exercise, trying to roll and maintain your own email is fraught with difficulties.
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