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SPF contains a term receivers can’t parse

CODE RED

SPF · Critical · costs 40 points · RFC 7208 section 4.6.1

What it means

the offending value is neither a valid mechanism nor a valid modifier. An unrecognised mechanism is a permanent error, so the whole record, every sender in it, fails.

How to fix it

Remove or correct the offending value. Valid mechanisms are all, include, a, mx, ptr, ip4, ip6 and exists.

Check your own domain

This page describes the condition. To find out whether your domain has it, run the SPF test or the full checkup, which examines every record at once.

Understand it properly

This page covers one condition. For the whole picture, What is SPF, and the ten-lookup limit, or start at the Health Library.

Where this comes from

We judge this against RFC 7208 section 4.6.1. Every finding on this site cites the specification behind it so you can check the work rather than take our word for it.

Other SPF conditions

SPF_UNKNOWN_TERM

Every fix on this site is yours to implement. If you would rather someone did it, I take this work directly.