From and Return-Path error in email header

#1

I’m not sure if this is an issue for DreamHost or Google…

I use Google Apps for my email, with accounts linked to domains hosted at DreamHost.

I have just received an email that has the following in its header:
Return-Path: garyjones1960@greengoblin.dreamhost.com
and
From: garyjones1960@greengoblin.dreamhost.com (Gary Jones)

Well, that’s clearly not right; I’m the recipient, not the sender. As a result, my own name now appears in the “From” column in my Inbox, making my Inbox confusing. It also introduces incorrect identifying text when including a quote in a reply.

Note that the sender used my email address as displayed on my website, and this email address is “info@” followed by my own domain name, which is completely different to greengoblin.dreamhost.com (even though that’s the server where I host my domain).

Any ideas why this is happening and how to stop it?

Thanks.

Gary

#2

If your mail script (PHP or whatever) doesn’t include a From-address, the one you get will be made. Read here: http://php.net/mail under “additional headers”

#3

Thanks for the reply. Are you suggesting that the sender’s email system isn’t creating the header properly? (In which case there’s nothing I can do.)

What I didn’t make explicitly clear in the OP was that the mail I received was the first in the conversation i.e. the sender wasn’t replying to an email of mine, or forwarding someone else’s; he took my address from my website and typed it into his email client/website.

Gary

#4

Ok - it’s not your system. I didn’t see that.

It looks that a ‘From: garyjones1960’ has been made in the mail-header, which then expands to garyjones1960@greengoblin.dreamhost.com, or rather:
'From: “Gary Jones” ’

Had it been: ‘From: garyjones1960@example.com’ or ‘From: “Gary Jones” garyjones1960@example.com’ nothing would have changed.

Why not send them a mail …