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Good messages going to junk

I have disabled the "enable junk mail filtering" entirely on my Macbook Pro, but Mail continues to send both good and bad messages to the junk folder. What am I missing? I need to stop Mail from separating what it thinks are junk messages.


I'm sure this has been asked before, but I didn't see anything current. Thanks in advance for any help you can offer me.

MacBook Pro 15″, OS X 10.11

Posted on Aug 22, 2021 10:12 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Aug 22, 2021 11:00 AM

Perhaps your email provider is moving them into the Spam mailbox before they get to you.

If you are using iCloud for email, it has a separate Junk filter. Almost every email provider provides some Spam filtering.


At one time it was obvious if Mail moved the message or it was put there by the email server. I'm not sure if it still is. I don't get enough junk mail to determine if it still marks them differently. If they were a brownish-yellow color and had the message "Mail thinks this is Junk," then it was Mail that moved them. If it didn't, then it was moved prior to arriving on your Mac.


If there is not an obvious difference, the only way I think you could determine the cause is if you cleaned up the current junk, closed Mail, then only accessed the email through your provider's web portal. If messages get moved to Spam (or Junk if iCloud), then it is the server doing it.

4 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Aug 22, 2021 11:00 AM in response to bdavisnyc

Perhaps your email provider is moving them into the Spam mailbox before they get to you.

If you are using iCloud for email, it has a separate Junk filter. Almost every email provider provides some Spam filtering.


At one time it was obvious if Mail moved the message or it was put there by the email server. I'm not sure if it still is. I don't get enough junk mail to determine if it still marks them differently. If they were a brownish-yellow color and had the message "Mail thinks this is Junk," then it was Mail that moved them. If it didn't, then it was moved prior to arriving on your Mac.


If there is not an obvious difference, the only way I think you could determine the cause is if you cleaned up the current junk, closed Mail, then only accessed the email through your provider's web portal. If messages get moved to Spam (or Junk if iCloud), then it is the server doing it.

Aug 27, 2021 11:05 AM in response to bdavisnyc

I have the same problem lately, with some good mail, such as subscription to Washington Post and other subscriptions, now going to Junk . There used to be a button "Not Junk" to i.d. such errors on the Junk mail screen, not there anymore. I drag the good mail back to Inbox but it doesn't seem to "learn" the lesson.


These are done by Mail, they are all labeled Mail thinks this is Junk, and are yellow/brown in the Junk folder. I don't know what to do in Preferences. Please advise.

Dorothy

Mac OS Big Sur 11.5.2 and Mail 14.0

Aug 27, 2021 11:15 AM in response to waldort

waldort wrote:

I have the same problem lately, with some good mail, such as subscription to Washington Post and other subscriptions, now going to Junk . There used to be a button "Not Junk" to i.d. such errors on the Junk mail screen, not there anymore. I drag the good mail back to Inbox but it doesn't seem to "learn" the lesson.

The Move to Inbox button does the same as “Not Junk” did. if Mail isn’t marking them as junk as I described above, Mail has nothing to learn. If it didn’t move them there in the first place, the button name doesn’t matter. It can’t learn from what it doesn’t know.

Good messages going to junk

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