SMTP Auth and Google

Opto_Will

We understand that Google is going to be deprecating basic authentication for SMTP very soon (at the end of the month?) and that Microsoft is in the process of doing the same as well.

We currently use rti_sendmail (or lets say the newer RTI_EMAIL_CLIENT to support TLS) and I am thinking when that heppens that the SMTP part of our ecosystem (as opposed to where we offload to Outlook etc) will no longer work natively with OI.

Will SRP Mail likewise be affected by these changes?

I guess I am looking at what others are doing as a solution? I know Revelation last year recommended 3rd party relay services as an official workaround....

KevinFournier

Expect rough seas ahead. It's not as simple as just updating the guts of RTI_EMAIL_CLIENT or SRP_SEND_MAIL. OAuth is two-factor authentication with temporary tokens, so the days of automated email (for GMail and MS Exchange at least) are coming to an end.

We have until October 1st, as far as I can tell, so hopefully we'll have a solution by then. Even then, it will require a lot of hoops for developers. Gmail, for example, will require setting up a lot of permission on the server side, getting secret keys, popping up an OAuth login page, etc.

For many devs, it might be better to work with a 3rd party mass email provider or setup your own smtp server to keep things truly automated. It depends on your apps needs.

CorbyNagel

My understanding is that Google will be deprecating Basic Auth SMTP when using the account's password and start requiring an app password for SMTP. So using Gmail as an SMTP relay will still be an option but only via app password security. We have been using this method and I actually prefer it as the Gmail's account credentials are not stored in code, only the app password. Here is a Google article on configuring app passwords: https://support.google.com/mail/answer/185833?hl=en

That being said, Office 365 appears to be removing basic auth SMTP in the near future. For clients currently using Office 365, we are recommending using SendGrid as an SMTP relay.

Opto_Will

Thanks for the comments.
I have thought there might be some rough seas for quite some time but have never been able to get the traction to be able to allocate any serious time/resource to it.

While I hope it is not all the gloom and doom that @KevinFournier is painintg, I suspect it might just be. I am liking the 3rd party SMTP provider solution but will also look into the App Password option that @CorbyNagel noted.