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iOS Mail app deleted everything in my Yahoo Mail Inbox. How can I recover it?

I have used Yahoo Mail for 20 years and loved that I can access it from any iPhone, iPad or PC and it's always there. Unfortunately, my world came crashing down last week when ALL the 50,000+ messages that had been accumulating in my Yahoo inbox disappeared suddenly when checking email on my iPhone 5 using iOS Mail app. I assumed it would correct itself, as occasionally the messages briefly disappear when loading new email messages, but the Inbox was EMPTY, and only new emails would appear from that point on. Incredibly, all the messages I had previously moved to separate folders (receipts, sent mail, specific topics that I categorized, etc) in my Yahoo Mail were still there in the folders untouched, but the uncategorized messages left in the Inbox vanished.


I tried every trick I knew to try to fix it: I closed the mail app, turned iPhone off then on. I held down Power button and Home button for soft reset. I logged all my devices out of My Yahoo Mail account, turned phone off and on and and logged back in but mail is still missing and 5 days later not coming back. I tried looking at my Yahoo Mail on my desktop PC using the Yahoo Mail main website interface but nothing but new messages were showing up in my Inbox. I looked in other folders, but they weren't there, except I did see some messages from the 3 days prior to the disappearance in the Trash. Some of those I know I put in the trash, but some I don't think I intentionally trashed, so I moved those I could back to Inbox. Any device I had used in the past that had email in the inbox also "disappears as it connects to the internet to update the contents.


I next chatted with the tech support folks at Yahoo Mail, and they said that unfortunately they have seen this happen before, where a third party app like iOS mail is used and accidentally deleted email from Yahoo's server through an IMAP connection, and because the Yahoo app or Yahoo website wasn't used to delete it, their restore files don't contain the missing email and they are unable to restore the missing emails. Only if the emails were deleted on their servers would the emails be available in their restore files. That is so frustrating. I feel like my house burned down and I've lost so many things that were always available to look up by searching my emails. Does anyone have any more ideas? Has anyone else had a similar experience? I'm not sure exactly how it happened, but maybe the "trash all" button was accidentally pressed, but I would assume one would need to "select all" first, right?


HELP! and thank you in advance

iPhone 5, iOS 9.3.1

Posted on Jun 7, 2016 8:25 PM

Reply
13 replies

Jan 3, 2017 6:38 PM in response to bufmedstud

Hello


baskingridgerealtor

replied to you on 9 Sept 2016... with :


"Apparently, somehow the new IOS update of 9/8 put them all in a new file and archived them."

I wanted to ask WHERE the files can be found? How do I get them back? I did the search and found old ones, but don't know how to get them back in my inbox. Yahoo say they have no phone line that I can call.


Any help would be appreciated.


I don't know how to contact bankingridgerealto wither!???


thanks

J

Jan 2, 2018 1:38 PM in response to bufmedstud

Same here. Noticed week or so ago that I wasn't getting any new personal emails from Yahoo on my phone. It kept saying it didn't have my password. I tried to enter it in Settings, but there was no place for it. Checked online, and it said to delete the account and reenter it. Which i assumed would just delete it from my phone. But it deleted it from the server. Holy Crap ... who would ever do that. Anyway, I started getting emails again so i thought things were okay. Until today when I went to look at my folders in Yahoo and they were gone. So were any emails prior to 12/19. There is so much in there. Don't know if I can reconstruct the important stuff. Contacted Yahoo but the oldest they account for is 7 days ... and this has been longer because of holiday I haven't looked at the whole personal account for a few days. 😟

Jan 3, 2018 5:09 AM in response to Pixchips

So sorry to hear that. It’s a shame we can’t get more support on this really. The only support from yahoo is that restore request form, it’s impossible to speak to someone. And Apple will refer you back to yahoo even though it’s clearly an issue between iOS/OS X interface with yahoo

Jul 19, 2016 9:03 PM in response to bufmedstud

Hello bufmedstud,


This response is for those that encounter the same issue. I am afraid it might be too late to be useful for you. Yesterday I encountered the exact same issue you described above. My yahoo inbox was completely wiped out from the native Mail app in my iphone. I was looking at my inbox (30,000+ mails even mails from my deceased mom where gone) and all of the sudden it went blank, nothing in my trash and nowhere to be found. I logged out and logged in to yahoo mail from a browser (my computer) as well as my regular Mac-Mail application in my computer and they were all gone.


I searched online and feared the worse. Apparently the glitch in iOS has affected many. So I immediately deleted my accounts (Gmail and Yahoo) from the Mail app in my phone and downloaded Gmail and Yahoo apps to prevent a third party managing my inboxes. Until I found this link:

help.yahoo.com/l/us/yahoo/mail/ymail/restore.html


I filled up this form and waited. The next morning I got two emails from Yahoo support with no content but also all my emails back. I am not sure what happened but I would advice to act fast before more time passes and avoid using the Mail app in iphone.


I hope this helps others.

Sep 9, 2016 12:01 PM in response to bufmedstud

Today the same thing happened to me with the newest IOS update. After searching and being on hold with Yahoo, I googled my heart out. Someone suggested going to the search bar and searching for an email from someone received during the gap. Sure enough, all my emails were there. When the Yahoo person came back I asked him to find where the emails were stored. Apparently, somehow the new IOS update of 9/8 put them all in a new file and archived them.


So there they sit intact in a buried archive file.


If you have this problem, go to the search bar where you would normally search for an email. Enter the name of someone you received prior emails from, and you can find where they are hidden. You can also first search for a file called archive which in my case didn't exist before this ios update. I have tens of thousands of emails and all were found and safe.


Hope this helps someone today!

iOS Mail app deleted everything in my Yahoo Mail Inbox. How can I recover it?

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