Email Authentication (DKIM Configuration)

Updated October 25, 2022 14:21

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DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail) authenticates the email you send from Slate. It lets email servers know that an email is actually from you and not from a spammer. This improves deliverability and makes your email less likely to be caught in spam filters. It also removes the “Sent via” label in Gmail and other email clients.

DKIM requires your IT group to add a small entry to the DNS record for your domain. A DNS record matches hostnames (a friendly name like “www.google.com”) to the actual IP address of a server on the internet (e.g., 172.217.2.206).

We have a DKIM tool to help you set this up. It involves creating a DKIM configuration and sharing it with your IT group. Once they have updated the DNS records, click on a “validate” link for DKIM to take effect.

Set Up DKIM for Outgoing Slate Emails

Select Database on the top navigation bar
Select DKIM Configuration.
Enter your email domain and click Lookup.
If this is the first time you have set up DKIM, you will see a status of “Inactive / Awaiting Configuration.” Click on Create Configuration.

The email domain is the part after the “@” in the email address you use for emails sent from Slate. It defaults to your school’s domain name, e.g., “college.edu.”
A small window will pop up where you can set a subdomain. As a best practice, we recommend you leave this as the default, slate-mx, unless your IT group notifies you that this subdomain is already in use.
Click Save.

Best Practices

You must share these details with your IT group, specifically those responsible for DNS records. They must update your school’s DNS records with these values.

Once your IT group has added these records, return to your DKIM page and click on the “Validate Configuration” link.
Once the configuration has been validated successfully, you are all set. DKIM will start being used with any emails you send from Slate.

If your IT group notifies you that this subdomain is already in use and you've already begun the set-up, you can delete the existing configuration and re-follow the steps above, choosing a new subdomain value at step 5.

Validate DKIM Configuration

Select Database on the top navigation bar
Select DKIM Configuration.
Enter your email domain and click Lookup.
Click Validate Configuration.
If all three DNS records appear in black, your DKIM configuration is valid. If any appear in red (such as the third one in the screenshot at left), those are not yet valid, and you must ask your IT group to ensure the appropriate DNS records are published.

Set Up DKIM for Additional Email Domains

Slate supports DKIM configuration for multiple domains should you send an email from Slate on behalf of various subdomains. By default, Slate will allow you to add DKIM configuration for any subdomain that falls under your Slate database domain. For example, if your database domain is apply.undergrad.slateuniversity.edu, you can create DKIM configuration for students.undergrad.slateuniversity.edu. You will not be able to create a DKIM configuration for students.graduate.slateuniversity.edu, however, since this domain is not part of your Slate instance domain. You first need to add domains such as these to the Allowed Service Domains list using the steps below.

Select Database on the top navigation bar
Select Configuration Keys.
Open the Allowed Service Domains List key.
Add your intended email domain(s) to this key as a comma-separated list.
Click Save
Allow 15-20 minutes for this updated configuration key to propagate to all web servers.
Return to DKIM Configuration and add the configuration for the new domain using the steps above.