# Our church's Web Host is a spammer



## Nebrexan (May 5, 2014)

We've discovered our Web host, IX Web Hosting, is on a spammer blacklist, which is causing some on our all-church mailing list to not get list e-mail (the ISP deletes the message before it's delivered). Adding the list's address to contacts fixes it for some ISPs but not others.

Are you happy with your Web host, especially its mailing list functionality? Any and all recommendations are appreciated!


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## jogri17 (May 13, 2014)

I do suggest Squarespace. All their sites are mobile responsive, they have beautiful templates, and they have strong importing abilities from other services. Plus for more advanced Web Developers, they have great tools. The prices are reasonable low for what they offer. Good customer service also.


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## wtleaver (May 13, 2014)

Try a Christian Host like http://www.mediaserve.com


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## Nebrexan (May 13, 2014)

After beginning a trouble ticket with IX Web Hosting on this issue, I was just minutes ago pleasantly surprised to hear from them that they are working with the organization that runs the spam blacklist to have their server removed from the list. My skeptical side expected to be given workarounds, so we _may_ be in the clear if they're successful.


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## Tirian (May 14, 2014)

For church email distribution, it is hard to go past Google Groups for reliability and freedom from blacklisting etc. You don't have to change your hosting provider at all - simply create a Google Group email only list, and import your distribution email addresses and take it from there.

I've set that up so the congregation can't send to the list, but the pastor and associate pastor can - just by sending an email to the google group email address.


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## Semper Fidelis (May 14, 2014)

Nebrexan said:


> After beginning a trouble ticket with IX Web Hosting on this issue, I was just minutes ago pleasantly surprised to hear from them that they are working with the organization that runs the spam blacklist to have their server removed from the list. My skeptical side expected to be given workarounds, so we _may_ be in the clear if they're successful.



It's not necessarily the case that the host itself is the spammer. In fact, I doubt it's them. They've been in business for over a decade.

The blacklist is likely listing the IP as a spam source, which likely means that one of the sites they hosted is sending out spam. I've seen this happen with one of the sites I host through Rackspace where malware was installed on the site and it started to send out spam. The owner of the domain was not, himself, spamming others but the site had become a slave for spamming.

The recommendations you received from others regarding other hosts would not make one immune from this problem.


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## Nebrexan (May 15, 2014)

Semper Fidelis said:


> The blacklist is likely listing the IP as a spam source, which likely means that one of the sites they hosted is sending out spam.



Correct, Rich, I should have been more specific that it's one of IX Web Hosting's mail servers that has the spammer reputation. It's been on MIPSpace's list for quite some time.


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