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IMAP Email is suddenly OCCASIONALLY garbage

SomeCallMeTim
SomeCallMeTim

Exactly after the upgrade to Thunderbird 60, I noticed that A LOT of my email folder was absolute garbage.

Some messages clearly had content from other messages. Sometimes messages would have unrendered HTML text at the top. Some were simply distorted.

But SOME were fine.

I nuked my Thunderbird email folder, had it refresh the whole history from IMAP, and things were fine again...for a while. Now I'm getting occasional garbage messages again. Mail that when I look at them in my provider's WebMail app, are perfectly normal.

I have been using Thunderbird with the same settings for YEARS. I doubt it's an IMAP setup problem. I hadn't ever seen Thunderbird break an email message (aside from the occasionally poorly-rendered HTML) or have parts of one message bleeding into another.

It seems like Thunderbird 60 has a REALLY BAD mailbox corruption bug. But searching for others with the same problem isn't showing any other results.

Thoughts? I'm on Windows, on Thunderbird 60.5.0/32-bit.

Happy to try other versions, but I suspect that once my email box is corrupted, I'll need to nuke it and re-download my entire email history again. My email history is NOT SMALL, so please don't ask me to do that until you have some sense that the bug has actually been fixed. "Try the new version, maybe it's fixed" does not count.

Exactly after the upgrade to Thunderbird 60, I noticed that A LOT of my email folder was absolute garbage. Some messages clearly had content from other messages. Sometimes messages would have unrendered HTML text at the top. Some were simply distorted. But SOME were fine. I nuked my Thunderbird email folder, had it refresh the whole history from IMAP, and things were fine again...for a while. Now I'm getting occasional garbage messages again. Mail that when I look at them in my provider's WebMail app, are perfectly normal. I have been using Thunderbird with the same settings for YEARS. I doubt it's an IMAP setup problem. I hadn't ever seen Thunderbird break an email message (aside from the occasionally poorly-rendered HTML) or have parts of one message bleeding into another. It seems like Thunderbird 60 has a REALLY BAD mailbox corruption bug. But searching for others with the same problem isn't showing any other results. Thoughts? I'm on Windows, on Thunderbird 60.5.0/32-bit. Happy to try other versions, but I suspect that once my email box is corrupted, I'll need to nuke it and re-download my entire email history again. My email history is NOT SMALL, so please don't ask me to do that until you have some sense that the bug has actually been fixed. "Try the new version, maybe it's fixed" does not count.

All Replies (2)

christ1
christ1
  • Top 25 Contributor

The most likely culprit is your anti-virus software messing with Thunderbird mail files. Below are some generic suggestions to avoid these problems.

Create an exception in your anti-virus software for the Thunderbird profile folder, so that the anti-virus real-time scanner will not scan it. http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_folder_-_Thunderbird

Don't let your anti-virus software scan incoming and outgoing messages.

Don't let your anti-virus software scan attachments.

Don't let your anti-virus software intercept your secure connection to the server.

Remove any add-ons your anti-virus software may have installed in Thunderbird.

Keep it working. http://kb.mozillazine.org/Keep_it_working_-_Thunderbird

And last but not least, backup your Thunderbird profile on a regular basis. https://support.mozilla.org/kb/profiles-where-thunderbird-stores-user-data#w_backing-up-a-profile

SomeCallMeTim
SomeCallMeTim Question owner

Thanks for the pointers! Hadn't thought of anti-virus.

It really seemed like the 60.x update was when the messages started being corrupted, but I suppose it's possible that Norton is messing with it?

I've disabled all of Norton's email features and blocked Norton from even scanning files in the Thunderbird AppData folder. I'll see if I still see any corruption after this.

Thanks again! I'll follow up if it comes back.