Understanding Email Headers

Everyone knows how to send and recieve emails but only a few understand the concept behind the process. Emails are normally not send directly from your machine to the recipient. Mailservers that are setup by your ISP for instance process incoming emails and send them on their way. This information is stored in the headers of the email. Understanding email headers helps you identify spam directed at you.

The article “reading email headers - all about email headers” gives you an indepth overview about email headers. Everything is explained with examples which makes it easy to follow through, even for people who lack the tech background.  It begins with a introduction “where mail comes from” and details “mail protocols” thereafter. The final part consists of a list of common mail headers which is great if you want to understand a certain part of the header.