Patent ID: 7882204

Claim:
A method of configuring a mail server appliance for operation with a support service, comprising: receiving a request for a domain name from the support service to be assigned to the mail server appliance; receiving a request for a certificate for the mail server appliance that asserts ownership of the requested domain name; authenticating the request for the certificate from the mail server appliance; assigning the requested domain name to the mail server appliance based on whether the request has been authenticated and whether the domain name is available; recording a mail exchange record for the assigned domain name that points to mail servers of the support service; configuring mail servers of the support service to accept and relay mail for the requested domain name to the mail server appliance; receiving an ODMR request from the mail server appliance; recording an address from which the ODMR request originated; and relaying mail to the recorded address for the domain owned by the mail server appliance.