How to verify an email address really exists by sending a mail in java

Question

Our web application sends email to every user who enters their email id. But how can i make sure that email id entered by user is valid one.Actually what we do when any user enters a email id we send link to his email id to activate the acount. I have a code for sending emails. But it doesnot give me any errors even if mail id does not exists. Will you please tell me how to solve the problem ? If email id does not exists really it should give some error.

I am here attaching my code

    package csv;
    import javax.mail.PasswordAuthentication;
    import java.util.Properties;
    import javax.activation.DataHandler;
    import javax.activation.DataSource;
    import javax.activation.FileDataSource;
    import javax.mail.BodyPart;
    import javax.mail.Message;
    import javax.mail.MessagingException;
    import javax.mail.Multipart;
    import javax.mail.Session;
    import javax.mail.Transport;
    import javax.mail.internet.AddressException;
    import javax.mail.internet.InternetAddress;
    import javax.mail.internet.MimeBodyPart;
    import javax.mail.internet.MimeMessage;
    import javax.mail.internet.MimeMultipart;

    public class email {

public void send(String recipeintEmail, 
        String subject, 
        String messageText,String[] attachments) 
        throws MessagingException, AddressException {
    /*
       It is a good practice to put this in a java.util.Properties 
       file and encrypt password. Scroll down 
       to comments below to see 
       how to use java.util.Properties in JSF context. 
    */
    String senderEmail = "our email address";
    String senderMailPassword = "password";
    String gmail = "smtp.gmail.com";

    Properties props = System.getProperties();

    props.put("mail.smtp.user", senderEmail);
    props.put("mail.smtp.host", "smtp.gmail.com");
    props.put("mail.smtp.port", "465");
    props.put("mail.smtp.starttls.enable", "true");
    props.put("mail.smtp.debug", "true");
    props.put("mail.smtp.auth", "true");
    props.put("mail.smtp.socketFactory.port", "465");
    props.put("mail.smtp.socketFactory.class", 
          "javax.net.ssl.SSLSocketFactory");
    props.put("mail.smtp.socketFactory.fallback", "false");

    // Required to avoid security exception.
    email.MyAuthenticator authentication = 
          new email.MyAuthenticator(senderEmail,senderMailPassword);
    Session session = 
          Session.getDefaultInstance(props,authentication);
    session.setDebug(true);

    MimeMessage message = new MimeMessage(session);

    BodyPart messageBodyPart = new MimeBodyPart();      
    messageBodyPart.setText(messageText);

    // Add message text
    Multipart multipart = new MimeMultipart();
    multipart.addBodyPart(messageBodyPart);

    // Attachments should reside in your server.
    // Example "c:\file.txt" or "/home/user/photo.jpg"

    for (int i=0; i < attachments.length; i++) {        

        messageBodyPart = new MimeBodyPart();       
        DataSource source = new FileDataSource(attachments[i]);
        messageBodyPart.setDataHandler(new DataHandler(source));
        messageBodyPart.setFileName(attachments [i]);          
        multipart.addBodyPart(messageBodyPart) ;  
    }



    message.setContent(multipart);                
    message.setSubject(subject);
    message.setFrom(new InternetAddress(senderEmail));
    message.addRecipient(Message.RecipientType.TO,
        new InternetAddress(recipeintEmail));

    Transport transport = session.getTransport("smtps");
    transport.connect(gmail,465, senderEmail, senderMailPassword);
    transport.sendMessage(message, message.getAllRecipients());

    transport.close();

}

private class MyAuthenticator extends javax.mail.Authenticator {
    String User;
    String Password;
    public MyAuthenticator (String user, String password) {
        User = user;
        Password = password;
    }

    @Override
    public PasswordAuthentication getPasswordAuthentication() {
        return new javax.mail.PasswordAuthentication(User, Password);
    }
}


public static void main(String args[]) throws MessagingException
{
    // email e=new email();
   // String at[]={"c:/COPYRIGHT.txt"};
  //  e.send("[email protected]", "hello","test"  )");
}

}

Answer 1

There is no fool-proof way to do this. You may try steps explained in this blog post but it is not guaranteed to work with all kinds of mail server/relay set up.

Send the user an activation key along with the URL and that will make it necessary to provide a valid email id if the user wants to log in/use what you are providing.

Answer 2

You can use java mail API to validate the email.

    try {
            //
            // Create InternetAddress object and validated the supplied
            // address which is this case is an email address.
            InternetAddress internetAddress = new InternetAddress(email);
            internetAddress.validate();
            isValid = true;
        } 
        catch (AddressException e) {
            System.out.println("You are in catch block -- Exception Occurred for: " + email);
        }

You can download java Mail APIs from http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/index-138643.html