System and method for evaluating domains to send emails while maintaining sender reputation

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10135766-B2
Application number	US-201414488903-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 17, 2014
Priority date	Sep 17, 2013
Publication date	Nov 20, 2018
Grant date	Nov 20, 2018

Abstract

Systems, device and techniques are disclosed for evaluating domains to send emails while maintaining sender reputation. Registration records of a domain are retrieved. The registration records include a mail server record and one or more records linking the domain to another domain or to an IP address. The mail server record is verified to be associated with a domain that is not on a black list. A webpage is retrieved from a website associated with the one or more records linking the domain to another domain or to an IP address. The webpage is compared to webpages for websites that are on white lists. An electronic communications sending strategy is determined based on verifying that the mail server record is associated with a domain that is not on a blacklist and comparing of the webpage to webpages for websites that are on one or more white lists.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A computer-implemented method for evaluating domains to send emails while maintaining sender reputation comprising:
retrieving a plurality of registration records of a domain, wherein the registration records include a mail server record and one or more records linking the domain to one or more of another domain and an IP address;
verifying that the mail server record is associated with a second domain that is not on any of one or more black lists, wherein the second domain is either the domain or a different domain;
retrieving a webpage from a website associated with the one or more records linking the domain to one or more of another domain and an IP address;
comparing the webpage to webpages for websites that are on one or more white lists;
comparing ownership information for the webpage to ownership information for at least one other website that comprises a website that is on at least one of one or more white lists;
determining an electronic communications sending strategy based on at least one of the verifying that the mail server record is associated with the second domain that is not on any of the one or more black lists, the comparing of the webpage to webpages for websites that are on one or more white lists, and the comparing of ownership information for the webpage to ownership information for at least one other website that comprises a website that is on at least one of one or more white lists; and
sending at least one electronic communication based on the electronic communications sending strategy, wherein the electronic communications sending strategy comprises:
sending an email to each email address of a subset of email addresses to which an email is to be sent using a secondary sending infrastructure distinct from a primary sending infrastructure, the secondary sending infrastructure associated with an IP address that is distinct from an IP address associated with the primary sending infrastructure, the subset of email addresses being associated with the domain, and the subset of email addresses being a subset of a set of all email addresses that are associated with the domain and to which an email is to be sent;
determining whether each of the emails arrived successfully at the email address to which each of the emails was sent; and
responsive to the determining that each of the emails sent to an email address of the subset of email addresses arrived successfully, sending an email to each email address in the set of email addresses that was not in the subset of email addresses.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the domain is a domain associated with an email address to which an email is to be sent.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the registrations records are Domain Name Server (DNS) records.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the one or more records linking the domain to one or more of another domain and IP address are Address (A) or Canonical Name (CNAME) records.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the mail server record is an MX record.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the one or more black lists include one or more of: spam lists, spam trap lists, block lists, and Doman Name System Block Lists.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the sending of an email to each email address in the set of email addresses that was not in the subset of email addresses uses either the primary sending infrastructure or the secondary sending infrastructure.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising observing changes in behavior of recipients of electronic communications.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 8 , wherein a change is observed when a behavior of recipients with email addresses associated with a domain for a tracking activity varies from a baseline for the tracking activity established based on recipients with email addresses associated with the domain.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 9 , wherein the tracking activity is opening emails, clicking links within emails, subsequently purchasing products from links opened within emails, or clicking advertisements within emails.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising determining that electronic communication has not been successfully sent to an electronic communication address associated with the domain before retrieving the plurality of registration records for the domain.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising identifying a potential misspelling of a name of the domain based on a comparison of the name of the domain to names of domains on a white list.

13. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the retrieving of the plurality of registration records comprises performing a WHOIS lookup on the domain.

14. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the verifying that the mail server record is associated with the second domain that is not on any of the one or more black lists further comprises verifying that a third party domain or a subdomain associated with the mail server record for the domain is not on any of the one or more black lists.

15. A system for evaluating domains to send emails while maintaining sender reputation, the system comprising:
a user device configured to receive email;
a primary sending infrastructure;
a secondary sending infrastructure;
a database, the database configured to store registration records, webpages, white lists, and one or more black lists; and
a host server electronically coupled to the database, the user device, the primary sending infrastructure, and the secondary sending infrastructure, the host server configured to:
retrieve a plurality of registration records of a domain, wherein the plurality of registration records include a mail server record and one or more records linking the domain to another domain or to an IP address;
verify that the mail server record is associated with a second domain that is not on any of the one or more black lists, wherein the second domain is either the domain or a different domain;
retrieve a webpage from a website associated with the one or more records linking the domain to another domain or to an IP address; and
compare the webpage to webpages for websites that are on one or more white lists;
compare ownership information for the webpage to ownership information for at least one other website that comprises a website that is on at least one of one or more white lists; and
determine an electronic communications sending strategy based on at least one of the verifying that the mail server record is associated with a second domain that is not on any of the one or more black lists, the comparing of the webpage to webpages for websites that are on one or more white lists, and the comparing of ownership information for the webpage to ownership information for at least one other website that comprises a website that is on at least one of one or more white lists, wherein the electronic communications sending strategy elects to send electronic communications through the primary sending infrastructure or the secondary sending infrastructure, wherein the host server is further configured to, in accordance with the electronic communications sending strategy:
send an email to each email address of a subset of email addresses to which an email is to be sent using the secondary sending infrastructure distinct from the primary sending infrastructure, the secondary sending infrastructure associated with an IP

Assignees

• Exacttarget Inc
• Salesforce Com Inc

Inventors

• Ciancio-Bunch James Michael

Classifications

• H04L63/101

  Access control lists [ACL] · CPC title

• H04L63/0236

  Filtering by address, protocol, port number or service, e.g. IP-address or URL · CPC title

• H04L51/12 Primary

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H04L61/1511

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H04L61/307

  Electricity · mapped topic