dkim=fail signature did not verify

Not specified by the original author.

TL;DR

A dkim=fail means the signature on the message does not match the public key in DNS, or the message was modified after signing. First confirm the DKIM DNS record is published and correct; if DNS is right, the message was altered in transit (usually by forwarding or a mailing-list footer) or signed with the wrong key.

dkim=fail signature did not verify

Use this when

• Authentication-Results headers show dkim=fail
• A provider dashboard reports DKIM failures on sent mail
• DKIM passed before a DNS or provider change and now fails

Not for this skill when

• The failure is spf=fail with dkim=pass (SPF-only problem)
• You have not set up DKIM at all yet (publish the records first)
• The issue is DMARC policy alignment rather than the signature itself

Steps

1. Look up the DKIM record: query [selector]._domainkey.[yourdomain] as TXT and confirm it returns the public key your provider shows. Expected: the DNS value matches the provider's expected value exactly.
2. Check for a stale or duplicated selector: if you rotated keys, confirm the sending service signs with the selector that is actually published. Expected: one active selector, matching on both sides.
3. Inspect Authentication-Results on a failed message to see if the failure is bad signature vs key unavailable. Expected: the reason names DNS vs crypto.
4. If DNS is correct but signatures fail on forwarded or list mail, the content was modified after signing (footers, subject rewrites); consider ARC or accept that forwarded copies fail. Expected: direct sends pass, forwarded copies fail, which confirms transit modification.
5. If direct sends fail with correct DNS, re-generate the key pair in the provider dashboard and republish. Expected: fresh signatures verify.

Variant phrasings

dkim signature did not verify

Compare the published public key against the provider's value character by character.

dkim fail bad signature

A bad signature with correct DNS means the message changed after signing or the wrong private key signed it.

Tool/version compatibility

Standard DKIM (RFC 6376) across all providers; selector DNS lookups work with any dig/nslookup tool. Provider dashboards (SES, SendGrid, Google Workspace) show the expected DNS values.

Why it happens

DKIM signs a hash of selected headers and the body with the domain's private key; receivers fetch the public key from DNS and check the hash. Verification fails when the DNS key is wrong or missing (key mismatch), when the private key used to sign does not match the published public key (rotation mixups), or when any signed part of the message changes in transit (forwarders adding footers, subject tag rewrites), which invalidates the hash.

Edge cases / pitfalls

• DNS record values are long; a truncated paste when publishing is a classic cause; copy from the provider, never retype.
• Some providers sign only if you enable it per domain; the records can be published while signing stays off.
• Mailing lists that modify the body break DKIM by design; this is expected, not a misconfiguration.
• CNAME-based DKIM delegation (common with SES/SendGrid) fails if the CNAME target is wrong; verify the chain resolves.

Provenance

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_YHYuPbNm4G73eHr4sdPAfg

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_YHYuPbNm4G73eHr4sdPAfg

Thread query: dkim=fail signature did not verify

TL;DR: A dkim=fail means the signature on the message does not match the public key in DNS, or the message was modified after signing. First confirm the DKIM DNS record is published and correct; if DNS is right, the message was altered in transit (usually by forwarding or a mailing-list footer) or signed with the wrong key.

Not specified by the original author.

TL;DR

Republish or re-enable DKIM signing in Proofpoint after the certificate rotation, confirm outbound mail actually carries a DKIM signature header from a test send, and check at Gmail, because signing silently disabled means every outbound message fails DMARC where SPF alignment alone does not save it. Prove it on one affected message before rolling it to the rest of mail on that sending or receiving path, because this fault repeats identically wherever the same condition holds and a fleet-wide or batch-wide first attempt multiplies the damage when the diagnosis is wrong.

dkim signing silently disabled after the proofpoint certificate rotation and outbound legitimate mail fails dkim at gmail

Use this when

• You see this exact error or symptom: dkim signing silently disabled after the proofpoint certificate rotation and outbound legitimate mail fails dkim at gmail.
• The failure is in the mail gateway, Exchange Online, Gmail or Yahoo receiving path named in the title, and it repeats on the same action rather than happening once and clearing.
• Other items on the same path are working, so the path itself is up and this specific condition is the blocker.

Not for this skill when

• A different error code, message, or tool is involved. Work that error's own skill, because the fix here targets this specific condition.
• The whole service or platform is down. Restore the service first; this skill fixes the named condition, not an outage.
• You cannot identify one affected item to test on. Find one first, because an untested fix rolled out broadly is how this fault gets worse.

Steps

1. Confirm the fault on one affected message first and capture the evidence before changing anything: check the message trace and the full Authentication-Results and rejection headers for one affected message, read on the receiving side, and record the exact error text, the record or host involved, and the time it happened. Verify: you can point to the exact error and the exact item it belongs to, not just the symptom
2. Republish or re-enable DKIM signing in Proofpoint after the certificate rotation, confirm outbound mail actually carries a DKIM signature header from a test send, and check at Gmail, because signing silently disabled means every outbound message fails DMARC where SPF alignment alone does not save it. Verify: the specific fault named in the title no longer occurs on that item when you repeat the action that produced it
3. Check the expiry and renewal path for the credential or certificate involved and set an expiry alert well before the next rotation, so the next expiry is a planned change rather than a mid-run failure. Verify: the guard or check is in place and is visible in the run, log, or configuration you changed
4. Retest end to end: send or release one test message through the exact same path and confirm it delivers with the expected authentication results. Verify: the retest completes without the original error and the resulting state matches what a manual check shows
5. Roll the fix out to the rest of mail on that sending or receiving path in the same way, watching the first few for the same error, and note the root cause and the change in the run or incident record. Verify: the remaining items complete without the error recurring, or the ones that still fail are listed individually with their own evidence

Variant phrasings

dkim signing silently disabled after the proofpoint fix

The verbatim error or code phrasing for this fault in the mail gateway; the fix is the same one in the steps above.

dkim signing silently disabled after the proofpoint certificate

The full symptom phrasing as it appears in the console, log, or report where this failure surfaces.

how to fix dkim signing silently disabled after the proofpoint

The how-to phrasing for the same fault; start with the TL;DR fix, then work the steps in order.

Compatibility: Exchange Online and Microsoft Defender, Gmail and Google Postmaster Tools, Yahoo bulk sender rules, Proofpoint, Mimecast, Barracuda and Cisco Secure Email Gateway as named in the title.

Why it happens

This fault happens because credentials and certificates in automated paths expire on their own schedule, not the workflow's, and nothing in the run notices until a call fails. In this case the condition is the one named in the title, in the mail gateway, Exchange Online, Gmail or Yahoo receiving path named in the title: the receiving or acting side reports the failure faithfully, but the underlying state (a record, a setting, a credential, a file, or a mapping) does not match what that action assumes. Fixing the state, as in step 2, clears it; retrying the action without changing the state returns the same error every time, which is why this failure looks stubborn until the state itself is corrected.

Provenance

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_xsWDpKnucHHJWSVTGe5shw

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_xsWDpKnucHHJWSVTGe5shw

Thread query: dkim signing silently disabled after the proofpoint certificate rotation and outbound legitimate mail fails dkim at gmail

TL;DR: Republish or re-enable DKIM signing in Proofpoint after the certificate rotation, confirm outbound mail actually carries a DKIM signature header from a test send, and check at Gmail, because signing silently disabled means every outbound message fails DMARC where SPF alignment alone does not save it. Prove it on one affected message before rolling it to the rest of mail on that sending or receiving path, because this fault repeats identically wherever the same condition holds and a fleet-wide or batch-wide first attempt multiplies the damage when the diagnosis is wrong.

Not specified by the original author.

TL;DR

Republish the DKIM record with each character-string correctly split at 255 characters and confirm with a DNS lookup tool that the joined key matches the signing key exactly, because a truncated joined key can never verify no matter how correct the signer is. Prove it on one affected message before rolling it to the rest of mail on that sending or receiving path, because this fault repeats identically wherever the same condition holds and a fleet-wide or batch-wide first attempt multiplies the damage when the diagnosis is wrong.

dkim dns record split across 255-character strings is truncated and the signature fails verification at gmail

Use this when

• You see this exact error or symptom: dkim dns record split across 255-character strings is truncated and the signature fails verification at gmail.
• The failure is in the mail gateway, Exchange Online, Gmail or Yahoo receiving path named in the title, and it repeats on the same action rather than happening once and clearing.
• Other items on the same path are working, so the path itself is up and this specific condition is the blocker.

Not for this skill when

• A different error code, message, or tool is involved. Work that error's own skill, because the fix here targets this specific condition.
• The whole service or platform is down. Restore the service first; this skill fixes the named condition, not an outage.
• You cannot identify one affected item to test on. Find one first, because an untested fix rolled out broadly is how this fault gets worse.

Steps

1. Confirm the fault on one affected message first and capture the evidence before changing anything: check the message trace and the full Authentication-Results and rejection headers for one affected message, read on the receiving side, and record the exact error text, the record or host involved, and the time it happened. Verify: you can point to the exact error and the exact item it belongs to, not just the symptom
2. Republish the DKIM record with each character-string correctly split at 255 characters and confirm with a DNS lookup tool that the joined key matches the signing key exactly, because a truncated joined key can never verify no matter how correct the signer is. Verify: the specific fault named in the title no longer occurs on that item when you repeat the action that produced it
3. Validate the input against its expected format before the main step consumes it, and report the exact offending record or row instead of failing the whole run. Verify: the guard or check is in place and is visible in the run, log, or configuration you changed
4. Retest end to end: send or release one test message through the exact same path and confirm it delivers with the expected authentication results. Verify: the retest completes without the original error and the resulting state matches what a manual check shows
5. Roll the fix out to the rest of mail on that sending or receiving path in the same way, watching the first few for the same error, and note the root cause and the change in the run or incident record. Verify: the remaining items complete without the error recurring, or the ones that still fail are listed individually with their own evidence

Variant phrasings

dkim dns record split across 255-character strings is fix

The verbatim error or code phrasing for this fault in the mail gateway; the fix is the same one in the steps above.

dkim dns record split across 255-character strings is truncated and the

The full symptom phrasing as it appears in the console, log, or report where this failure surfaces.

how to fix dkim dns record split across 255-character strings is

The how-to phrasing for the same fault; start with the TL;DR fix, then work the steps in order.

Compatibility: Exchange Online and Microsoft Defender, Gmail and Google Postmaster Tools, Yahoo bulk sender rules, Proofpoint, Mimecast, Barracuda and Cisco Secure Email Gateway as named in the title.

Why it happens

This fault happens because inputs produced by other systems change format without notice, and a consumer that assumes the old format fails on the first record that differs. In this case the condition is the one named in the title, in the mail gateway, Exchange Online, Gmail or Yahoo receiving path named in the title: the receiving or acting side reports the failure faithfully, but the underlying state (a record, a setting, a credential, a file, or a mapping) does not match what that action assumes. Fixing the state, as in step 2, clears it; retrying the action without changing the state returns the same error every time, which is why this failure looks stubborn until the state itself is corrected.

Provenance

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_1LwUpn70ViYCwMHuB7sFzg

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_1LwUpn70ViYCwMHuB7sFzg

Thread query: dkim dns record split across 255-character strings is truncated and the signature fails verification at gmail

TL;DR: Republish the DKIM record with each character-string correctly split at 255 characters and confirm with a DNS lookup tool that the joined key matches the signing key exactly, because a truncated joined key can never verify no matter how correct the signer is. Prove it on one affected message before rolling it to the rest of mail on that sending or receiving path, because this fault repeats identically wherever the same condition holds and a fleet-wide or batch-wide first attempt multiplies the damage when the diagnosis is wrong.