Robert K. McEwen, dba invaluement (Hickory, NC, USA) — a commercial, subscription-based anti-spam DNSBL service (lists launched 2007). · Both. invaluement runs three separate DNSBLs: ivmSIP (individual sending IPs) and ivmSIP/24 (whole /24 IP subnets) list IP addresses; ivmURI lists domains/hostnames (and some IPs) found in message-body links/URIs.
Invaluement (ivmSIP / ivmSIP/24 / ivmURI)
invaluement is a paid, subscription-only set of DNS blocklists that mail servers and spam filters query to catch spam that bigger lists like Spamhaus miss. It is deliberately aggressive at the edges — ivmSIP/24 pioneered "neighborhood"/snowshoe listing of entire /24 ranges, and ivmURI specializes in spammer-owned and hijacked domains appearing in email links — but it is engineered for an industry-leading low false-positive rate, comparable to Spamhaus Zen. It is far less widely deployed than Spamhaus or Barracuda, so a listing typically affects a smaller slice of recipients.
Why you get listed
- ivmSIP: an IP that sends only spam or an extremely high percentage of spam — most listings are botnet IPs, snowshoe spammers, or irresponsible/abused ESP IPs
- ivmSIP/24: spam-like activity seen across a subnet, so the whole /24 block gets listed (the 'neighborhood' approach) even if your individual IP wasn't the worst offender — common on shared/snowshoe ranges
- ivmURI: your domain (or a hostname/redirector you use) appearing as a link/URI inside spam messages — including newly-registered spammer domains and legitimate domains that were hijacked or whose links were abused
- Compromised servers, open relays, or a hacked website/form sending spam from your IP
- Sending unsolicited bulk/cold email or running a poorly-managed list that recipients report as spam
Impact
Used by professional email-security services, ISPs, and hosting providers that subscribe to invaluement (it's a paid feed, not free/public), so reach is narrower than Spamhaus. Where it IS deployed, a listing can cause hard rejections or spam-foldering for affected recipients. Because false positives are rare and listings are evidence-based, a listing usually means real spam was seen from your IP/domain — treat it as a signal to fix the source, not just to request removal.
How to delist from Invaluement (ivmSIP / ivmSIP/24 / ivmURI)
- First fix the root cause: stop the spam, secure any compromised server/site, and authenticate your mail (SPF/DKIM/DMARC). invaluement will simply relist (and removal gets harder) if spam continues.
- Go to the delist page (https://www.invaluement.com/removal/), type in your IP address or domain, and press the 'Check For Listing' button to confirm whether and on which list (ivmSIP, ivmSIP/24, or ivmURI) you're listed.
- If listed, follow the additional on-page delisting instructions it returns, which direct you to email invaluement a removal request (with a specified subject line) including the required details.
- In the request, explain why you think it got listed (if known), why it should no longer be listed, and include real contact information — sent from a legitimate ISP or your organization's own domain.
- Do NOT send the request from a free mailbox (Gmail/Yahoo/Hotmail/etc.) if possible — invaluement reserves the right to ignore anonymous requests that pair a freemail address with no legitimate contact info. There is no fee for delisting.
- For a research-only check of up to 10 IPs/domains at once without filing a request, use the faster lookup page (https://www.invaluement.com/research/).
Good to know
- Listings are time-based, but the self-removal path differs by list. ivmURI (domains) auto-delists roughly a couple of weeks after it was last seen in spam — if the source has genuinely stopped you can often just wait and it clears with no request. ivmSIP / ivmSIP/24 (IPs) also expire a set time after the last spam incident, but invaluement does NOT offer fully-automatic, no-request removal for them: you're expected to submit a delist request, which significantly shortens that expire time. Either way, fresh spam resets the clock and relists immediately.
- ivmSIP/24 lists a whole /24, so you may be 'guilty by neighborhood' on a shared/snowshoe range — the real fix may require getting OFF that range or having the range's owner clean it up, not just delisting your single IP.
- It's a paid subscription feed, not a public list, so many free 'blacklist checkers' can't actually query it — use invaluement's own research/removal pages (or a checker that licenses the data) for an authoritative answer.
- Repeated relisting makes manual removal harder and slower; invaluement may decline removal until the sending behavior is demonstrably fixed.
Stay off the lists in the first place.
Most listings trace back to volume spikes, bad lists, and cold domains. Scheduler Zero warms your domains, paces sending, and keeps your lists clean so you build reputation instead of blacklisting yourself.