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"Thunderbird thinks this message is a scam" - this warning only ever appears on progressive sites that I know aren't scams - que pasa aqui?

  • 11 replies
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  • Last reply by Matt

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To clarify my question, this warning even appears when I receive newsletters from my sister's bookstore "Readers' Books" in Sonoma (readersbooks.com), and it consistently appears ONLY on progressive/slightly-lefty appeals for support, contributions, etc. I'm not normally prone to conspiracy theories, but has Thunderbird been taken over by the right-wing? Just askin'.

To clarify my question, this warning even appears when I receive newsletters from my sister's bookstore "Readers' Books" in Sonoma (readersbooks.com), and it consistently appears ONLY on progressive/slightly-lefty appeals for support, contributions, etc. I'm not normally prone to conspiracy theories, but has Thunderbird been taken over by the right-wing? Just askin'.

Chosen solution

If you have "educated yourself on the scan detection, you already know it is very rudimentary and the things that set it off are also the things most email demographers like to include. Methods of tracking the recipients click-throughs from the email. To do this they will put a link in the email that looks like www.bookworld.com. But the link it goes to is www.bookworld.com/who?unicorn.consulting@gmail.com Similar, but one explicitly identifies the email the link is being clicked from. The other is a generic link.

Not only that, but if you forward the email, they get to know that as well. clever, simple, legal and not really ethical in my opinion.

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Yes it is a right wing conspiracy. Break out the tin foil hat. You can educate yourself on scam detection here. https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/thunderbirds-scam-detection You have 2 choices. Turn it on or turn it off.

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I'm not quite as stupid as you think I am, and I don't wear a tin foil hat. I had already "educated" myself on TBird's scam detection before I even thought of posting this.

I've noticed this trend for many many months and I'm just trying to figure out what's happening. The scam detection algorithms should be apolitical and they probably are, but pardon me for sensing that something else is happening here.

BTW, FU for your totally dismissive and unhelpful response!!!

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Not stupid. That is debatable. You think someone is trying to control your mind with an email client. But personal problems are out of the scope of this forum. So try Dr. Phil for that one.

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No I don't think anyone is trying to control my mind and it's not a personal problem.

For some reason unknown to me you seem to regard my posts as though they couldn't possibly address an actual issue.

I give up on having a rational discussion with you, since you seem to view me as some sort of enemy or threat, a relationship I never tried to establish with you, and one which I have no interest in continuing.

What drives you to be so dismissive, combative and hostile?

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So, I guess you consider yourself "progressive/slightly lefty" (or at least open to messages reflecting such an interest) and so presumably you sign up to sites that reflect that bias and interest.

Therefore I wonder how many "conservative/right-wing" messages you get in your Inbox to allow you to form a judgement that only these "progressive" messages are intercepted?

I am in the UK, which like much of Europe, would appear to many in the USA as a hotbed of socialism. I'm also signed up to centrist and left-wing groups (and that's probably all very left-looking to the average US citizen) and none of these messages have trouble landing. So I see no evidence of political bias being built into Thunderbird. And it's open source, so you're welcome to examine the code for the alleged political filtering.

If you have read up on the scam detection in Thunderbird, you should understand that it works on the number of external links, or reacts to practices such as the use of links which don't go where they say they do.

I have signed up to the readersbooks site to see what their newsletters look like. I'll report back if I can see any reason for Thunderbird flagging them.

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I thank you so much for your latest post. It was the first where you didn't address me as a nut case!

This morning your first two paragraphs started to make sense to me: of course I would never receive such warnings about right-wing sites, since I don't receive them. And to be clear, I never alleged political filtering (although that's what I first ignorantly assumed).

It may be that there's something common to most political sites (left or right) that trigger Thunderbird's warnings, but I'm not currently in a position to examine the code involved.

What I can assert is that I've never seen Thunderbird's scam warning on an actual scam.

If it would help you, I still have several examples of messages which trigger the warning. By sending them to myself, I learned that forwarding these msgs as attachments doesn't remove the warning. Would you like to receive such examples? If yes just provide me with an email address and I'll send them.

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I am not the same person who first replied to you. ;-)

Yes please, a copy would be useful. Please send it to

xenos at gmx dot co dot uk
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I should have noticed the change if only due to the complete absence of sarcasm and hostility ;-}

I'm sending you a few emails that trigger the response. (subj: Messages that trigger TBird warnings). Thanks for taking over.

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Chosen Solution

If you have "educated yourself on the scan detection, you already know it is very rudimentary and the things that set it off are also the things most email demographers like to include. Methods of tracking the recipients click-throughs from the email. To do this they will put a link in the email that looks like www.bookworld.com. But the link it goes to is www.bookworld.com/who?unicorn.consulting@gmail.com Similar, but one explicitly identifies the email the link is being clicked from. The other is a generic link.

Not only that, but if you forward the email, they get to know that as well. clever, simple, legal and not really ethical in my opinion.

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Thanks for the explanation. It does beg the question, though, as to whether such rudimentary scan detection is actually useful or just confusing. That's just a thought, no need to respond.

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skipnyc said

Thanks for the explanation. It does beg the question, though, as to whether such rudimentary scan detection is actually useful or just confusing. That's just a thought, no need to respond.

If it is useful or not is a rather vexing question. I leave it on, just to flag thing I might not otherwise look closely at. But it has been a very longstanding item on the improvements list.

The grand daddy to which all scam detection bugs, enhancement or not are linked is https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=654502

If you have an interest, it can make an interesting read. If you are looking for fast action, it is depressing.