Apple Mail IMAP and UTF-8

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Level 1

8 points

Apple Mail IMAP and UTF-8

On occasion I get an error on Apple mail that reads

Online Status

The following alerts are from the IMAP server for "Wightman"

Message ### appears to be a Unicode message and your E-mail reader did not enable Unicode support. Please use an E-mail reader that supports IMAP with UTF-8 (see https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6855.html).

Then this disappears after a few days or hours. I know not why. I'm afraid I'm missing emails or something. What is going on? Is this a configuration problem on my mail settings or something with my email provider?

MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 11.1

Posted on Jan 24, 2021 10:49 AM

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Answer 1

raina_b22

Community Specialist

Jan 26, 2021 4:04 PM in response to Nielsen Dirk

Hello Nielsen Dirk,

Welcome to Apple Support Communities. We understand that you are getting this error message when using the native Mail app on your MacBook Pro.

Do you have multiple email accounts and if so, does this seem to impact a certain account? Does this happen when you do anything in particular such as send an email using one of your accounts?

Check the Connection Doctor for issues with your accounts' mail servers as that might help you to pinpoint where this occurs. Have a look at Use Connection Doctor in Mail on Mac for guidance.

Take care.

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Answer 2

Jan 27, 2021 10:49 AM in response to Nielsen Dirk

Nielsen Dirk,

It sounds like this issue is isolated to a particular confirmation email that you receive from a certain source. Is that correct?

Try logging on to your provider's webmail and test there to see if the same issue occurs. That will help to isolate the issue to the email account or the Mail app.

Have a great day!

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Answer 3

SnickZ.

Community Specialist

Jan 27, 2021 2:58 PM in response to Nielsen Dirk

Nielsen Dirk,

Do you have any filters set up for incoming emails? If so, try turning those filters off and see if the same issue occurs. Check out Filter emails in Mail on Mac as a reference.

Do you have another admin account set up on your Mac? If so, test to see if the same issue occurs there. If not, set up a test admin account, then test. Check out set up users, guests, and groups on Mac for guidance on setting up a test account.

Cheers!

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Answer 4

Nielsen Dirk Author

Level 1

8 points

Jan 27, 2021 1:33 PM in response to barberlives123

Thank you.

On web portal of the IMAP email provider there is no error nor are there any of the missing emails. This error is strictly when using Apple Mail on this IMAP account and no where else.

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Answer 5

Nielsen Dirk Author

Level 1

8 points

Jan 27, 2021 4:32 AM in response to raina_b22

Thank you for your response.

Connection doctor shows no problems. I did however enable logging.

Some more developments:

This error seemed to pop up upon receipt of an confirmation email I get. When I changed the email address I use for that service to a different one (an @outlook.com account) I don't receive the error.

However when I take that confirmation email and store it in a folder in my original IMAP account I get a slightly different error.

" Your IMAP client does not appear to correctly implement Unicode messages, see https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6855.html"

Now some more information. When I use my original IMAP email address, I only get this confirmation email about 50% of the time. Frustrating. Is that related?

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Apple Mail IMAP and UTF-8

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