Email sent to and from no address

Question

Recently I received an Email, obviously sent by a Bot without a From and TO address . All the Email API's I've worked required at least the from address and To address

So i really don't know how the following happened

How is that possible How can someone or (some Bot) send an email with literally no From and To Addresses

(if you cant see the image: it is a screen shot showing the "From" and "TO" addresses being literally blank)

Are there any API that allow this functionality

I've even Checked the Mail header its says

From nobody Thu Jan 28 13:02:14 2010
X-Apparently-To:
vivek_bluestar@yahoo.co.in via
203.104.17.150; Thu, 28 Jan 2010 05:09:14 -0800 Return-Path:

X-YMailISG:

Answer 1

Have a look at :

http://db.ilug-bom.org.in/lug-authors/philip/docs/mail-stuff/smtp-intro.html

The sender can put anything he wants in the To and From headers. The SMTP server will deliver to the address defined with RCPT TO command. If your spam filter or mail server doesn't block it, it will get delivered.

Answer 2

You can enter what you want in the From: field of an e-mail. Most SMTP libraries should support this.

Answer 3

It is probably possible to write an email like this in code although I have never tried it. You can also talk to email servers directly and create email on them using telnet. There are many examples on the web, one is here.