What is DKIM, SPF and DMARC protection on a Plesk server?

Question

What is DKIM, SPF and DMARC protection?

Answer

Plesk supports a number of anti-spam solutions for validation of mail messages identity:

• DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail) is a method used to associate a domain name identity with an outgoing message and to validate a domain name identity associated with an incoming message through cryptographic authentication.
• SPF (Sender Policy Framework) is a method used to prevent sender address forgery, i.e. using fake sender addresses. It allows mail server to check that incoming mail from a domain comes from a host authorized by that domain’s administrator. In addition, Plesk uses SRS (Sender Rewriting Scheme), so that forwarded messages can pass SPF checking.
• DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance) is a technology to extend the capabilities of the SPF and DKIM methods. The DMARC policy defines how the receiver should treat email messages depending on the results of DKIM and SPF checking.

  Note: DMARC feature is not supported by MailEnable, so it is not available in Plesk for Windows Server with MailEnable installed.

Additional information can be found in Plesk documentation.

Note: disabling anti-spam tools will decrease protection of users from spam.

Additional information

How to protect a Plesk server from incoming spam and viruses

What is SPF and how to configure it on a Plesk server

How to check if DKIM is working on a domain