Newbie to authentication POP3

Newbie to authentication POP3

by Frankie Kam -
Number of replies: 3
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Hi 

I am new to this authentication thingy. My organisation uses a POP3 E-mail service, with the domain name cambridgeforlife.org

What I want to achieve is to allow a user to create a user account on my Moodle site using his or her cambridgeforlife.org email address as the username, e.g., frankie@cambridgeforlife.org, and his or her actual cambridgeforlife.org password. In this way, I can almost guarantee that the users of my Moodle site are actual company staff of Cambridge English For Life.

How do I do this?

I've already activated the built-in Authentication plugin, POP3. I've put in the IP value of my mail.cambridgeforlife.org in-coming mail server. Beyond this I don't know how to proceed.

Anyone can advise me what to do to achieve what I want?

Regards
Frankie Kam

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In reply to Frankie Kam

Re: Newbie to authentication POP3

by Ken Task -
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Some research for ya ...

is mail.x.x a mail gateway or is it the real EMail server for that domain?   Many networks today have mail gateways which check for virus/spam before communicating with the true mail server which is internal to a private network (and not directly accessible).   That internal mail server might have the same name in the internal DNS but goes to a private IP server - ie, the true mail server.

The actual authentication/users might be on that internal machine.

Inspect the headers of a message you've in your inbox to see what mail servers the mail actually ran through to reach your inbox.  And do that with a message known to come from an internal user while that user was on the domain network.  And do that with a message known to come from a domain user when outside the private network.  Think you might find other mail servers.

POP3 is an old protocol ... IF folks are still using it, hope they are using at least POP3S (adds 'security').   Most are probably using IMAP ... web based mail - in which the mail server is still NOT directly accessible.

Might consider using some other method of authenticating ... IMHO!   Yeah, I know it's in the list of authentications from which Moodle *could* be configured, but wonder how long it might be before that is no longer the case.

'spirit of sharing', Ken

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In reply to Ken Task

Re: Newbie to authentication POP3

by Robert Brenstein -
I wonder why you say that POP3 is old, Ken. POP3 and IMAP are about as old and neither uses secure connections. The S-variants do and these are newer indeed.

In terms of authentication, POP3 will work fine within a company. Besides putting the correct name or IP address of the server, you just need to find the correct POP-mode for your service, Franky. Simple trial and error can be used for that since there are only a few options.

Having said that, I suggest to talk to people running your mail service and check whether they also have IMAP running. Most mail server programs support both. Even if POP3 is used to retrieve mail, IMAP would be better for authentication because it does not impose exclusivity of connections. In other words, it does not conflict with fetching mails, even though that is usually not noticable by users.
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In reply to Frankie Kam

Re: Newbie to authentication POP3

by Frankie Kam -
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As a go-around solution, I set my Moodle site such that the only valid domain names in the email address field is cambridgeforlife.org. Therefore, only users with cambridgeforlife.org are allowed to save their account details. Seems to work for me.

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