Mail app is deleting new email before I can read them

**gern blanston** · 11-29-2011, 04:04 PM

The Mail app on my 4S is deleting new email on one of my Yahoo accounts before I can read them. I'll open the account and see several new emails, and the app starts deleting them immediately. The emails aren't moved to the trash, bulk, or anywhere else. All of my past emails are unaffected. I can view the new emails on Yahoo's website, however. All of my other Yahoo and Gmail accounts work normally on my iPhone. I've tried deleting and adding the account back to the iPhone, but the behavior remains.

Any help would be appreciated.

bonesb · 11-29-2011, 05:37 PM

Two ideas, one's a "duh" and the other you won't like at all.

First idea is that you have a desktop or other peripheral checking your account and deleting the messages from the server via POP. I have two Yahoo accounts and used Zimbra for ages until recently, tried using the native OS X Mail app and had that same "duh" moment when a few messages in one account "disappeared"; I switched to using webmail and the messages "mysteriously" stopped disappearing. Duh. Until a couple of weeks ago...

Here's the one you won't like. A couple of weeks ago, I got an email very early in the morning from one of my employees, saying that the link in an email I sent to him didn't work. After a few seconds of wondering, then a bit of panic set in when I got a second email, this one from a client, to the same effect. I logged into one of my two Yahoo accounts, and saw two more emails indicating "undeliverable" back from two more clients, with several other of my contacts in that account being shown as on a distribution list. Then, the two emails in my inbox "disappeared". My Yahoo account had been hacked, someone had siphoned off my contacts list and was sending email spam - but from a remote email client - the "sent" messages weren't in my account's sent outbox. Sh*t, I thought (without the asterisk) and got to a bit of a web search - I found the Yahoo page that seemed to be set up for just this purpose, and did what it recommended - changed my password - and then sent out a email to everyone in that account with a mea culpa. Evidently, several messages had been sent out, a few emails had been deleted, and I don't know if a local copy of my contacts had been swiped.

Since the password change, no more damage has been done, no more emails have randomly "disappeared", and I haven't been "spoofed". Had I not seen the messages being deleted before my eyes while in my webmail account and the rejection messages (complete with headers) for myself I may not have believed anyone else telling me it would happen. I made the mistake of trusting Yahoo, it turns out what happened to me isn't a unique experience, a few of my friends have had it happen to them too.

It wouldn't hurt you to change your password, and I hope for your sake it's something else? Like, a "duh" moment?

**gern blanston** · 11-29-2011, 08:19 PM

Thanks for the great info. I'm not using Mail on my Mac for this account, but I understand what you're saying. I will try changing my password. Since the account in question doesn't have any contacts associated with it (unless there's some way to get the contacts from main yahoo account that I don't realize), I hope that there's no damage done.

Thank you so much!

bonesb · 11-30-2011, 01:09 AM

I hope that I can help, wanting to clear up something for you. It's not just the contacts thing. The other side of my "spam" emails out - a benefit of sorts - was that the hacker facilitated a few connections to former clients of mine. What I left out of my earlier message was that I'd used the account I'd mentioned to store contacts while I'd transitioned from one email provider to another, but left the contacts on the Yahoo account - my bad. One of my clients, the director of an agency I'd worked for, stayed in touch on her personal account over a few years from time to time, but I'd get these emails from her entitled "****** left you a YouTube video..." - it turned out her Yahoo account was hacked like mine, but as a client I'd just wanted to not let her know, then it happened to me. It turned out her two Yahoo accounts were hacked like mine and she'd been missing expected emails too.

My point here is that your account could be used for spamming without your knowledge too. I'd sent my client a forwarded message I received over the weekend showing her the headers coming from her account, and her IT guys are on it now. It appears that it's not just the contacts but accounts are being hijacked to spam too. My client and I were getting messages deleted, I'm thinking the spammer was just clearing out inbox messages to cover their tracks, that's maybe what's going on with you too. Since I alerted her of the spamming, I haven't received any spam from her.

So, change your password, if you haven't already. Cheers!

**gern blanston** · 11-30-2011, 10:35 AM

Thank you for the clarification: that's good to know!

I did change my password, but the problem remains. The emails (only new ones) are deleted from my iphone Mail app as soon as I open the account. Oddly, they're still on my Yahoo's web email. Very puzzling.