Not Catching Spam With Airmail

Same dawgone thing here. Airmail just isn’t catching many spam for me, and I’m finding a whole slough of Spam coming in all at once and sitting in the inbox.

Version 2.6.1
SS 2.9.23

I moved the post from this thread. —MT

I’m having the issue in Airmail 2.6.1 where the training is not working. The same emails keep ending up in the inbox, even though I’ve used the Train as Spam contextual menu command.

I would say you have described my issues perfectly in recent months. SS just doesn’t seem to be all that effective either at training or catching obvious junk now.

The original poster mentioned several different issues. Please describe which ones apply to your situation.

That doesn’t necessarily mean that the training isn’t working. It could mean that Airmail is not filtering the incoming messages through SpamSieve. Please see the Checking the Airmail Setup instructions, which show how you can look in SpamSieve’s log to see whether it’s receiving any messages from Airmail.

Which version of Mac OS X are you using?

Hi Michael, thanks for responding.

I am using OSX 10.11.3.

I copied one entry from the log, for eg.

redicted: Spam (96)
Subject: Be ahead of your New Year’s resolution, start burning belly-fat now
From: dr.oz@ioweo.tupdate.top
Identifier: GMPbEzolHoliyxGgaVWgsg==
Reason: P(spam)=1.000[1.000], bias=0.000, sushi(1.000), casual(1.000), random(1.000), random(1.000), ^a-style-fontsize12pxcolorf4f5f5(1.000), dip(1.000), S:Year’s(1.000), dined(1.000), U:gohere(1.000), U:gohere(1.000), rustic(1.000), rustic(1.000), waitresses(1.000), U:viewnow(1.000), U:viewnow(1.000)
Date: 2016-02-19 20:27:49 -0600 (CST)

However, this email still sits in the Inbox. In fact, at this point, about 70% I am having to “train” to go into the Spam folder. But often, this training is ignored and the same offenders show up.

As regards the former poster, I’m referring to the problems he referred to here: “I have used SS for a long time successfully, but in the last month or so, it just stops working, and junk gets through. I can even select and train as spam and airmail moves them, but the stats counter doesn’t change on spam sieve and the log is empty, there are no Train (manuals) in there.”

Now, I have done the training, but in my case, it does show in the log, but doesn’t seem to apply the next time the spam comes in. Here is a log entry for the one above that I just trained.

Trained: Spam (Manual)
Subject: Be ahead of your New Year’s resolution, start burning belly-fat now
From: dr.oz@ioweo.tupdate.top
Identifier: GMPbEzolHoliyxGgaVWgsg==
Actions: added rule <From (address) Is Equal to “dr.oz@ioweo.tupdate.top”> to SpamSieve blocklist, added to Spam corpus (1338)
Date: 2016-02-19 20:34:21 -0600 (CST)

I did try a reinstall, but it hasn’t helped.

Thanks.

I just did another reinstall. I notice that SpamSieve isn’t evening opening now when I open Airmail.

It looks to me like the training is not being ignored. The log shows that SpamSieve learned from the message that you trained, and also that it correctly classified the message as spam. The problem is that Airmail didn’t move the predicted-spam message out of the inbox.

It sounds like you have a totally different situation because he got no log entries whereas you are getting both types of log entries.

I wouldn’t expect it to given what you reported above because it looks like SpamSieve is working normally. I think you’ll need to contact Airmail support about this because either Airmail is not trying to move the message after SpamSieve says it’s spam, or it is trying but is encountering an error.

Hi Michael, it is moving emails as soon as I train them. But then, if I am spammed again, I need to retrain them all over again.

Yes, however Airmail is not moving them when a new message arrives and SpamSieve tells it that the message is spam. You can see this because (a) the log says “Predicted: Spam” and (b) the message is in your inbox.

No, you don’t. It is not necessary (or recommended) to train a message as spam if the log already shows that SpamSieve classified it as spam.

Okay, so it looks like something in Airmail is amiss. I’ve got a pile of spam sitting in my inbox this morning. Thanks for taking the time to reply.

Right. Another user e-mailed me about a similar problem, so I’m going to talk with the Airmail developers and see if they can find a solution.

Thanks so much!

The Airmail developer recommends going to the Window menu and choosing Operations, which will show a log of Airmail’s actions.

The Operations window shows when Airmail does in fact identify and move spam; it doesn’t, however, explain why it often misses spam.

Today, I’ve been watching Airmail more carefully. It will go for awhile, catching tonnes of spam… and then all of a sudden, it starts letting spam through—stuff that’s already been marked as spam.

Puzzled.

What does the Operations window say about the messages in your inbox that SpamSieve’s log says “Predicted: Spam” for?

Here is your log on a spam:

Predicted: Spam (96)
Subject: Your room is waiting at Hilton Garden Inn
From: hiltongardeninn@h1.hilton.com
Identifier: 5rNPP668TElfxo+UyWV/0A==
Reason: P(spam)=1.000[1.000], bias=0.000, C:ROW(1.000), C:ROW(1.000), U:params(1.000), U:params(1.000), U:40markmallett(1.000), U:40markmallett(1.000), U:TRACK(1.000), C:only(1.000), C:only(1.000), U:RAF(1.000), C:do(1.000), C:do(1.000), dial(1.000), dial(1.000), T:Up(1.000)
Date: 2016-02-23 23:27:47 -0600 (CST)

But the Operations window in Airmail shows no record of this email, which is sitting in the inbox. If I do a “Train as Spam”, then it records it in the Operations window.

Same problem
Just wondering if there has been a resolution to this problem? I am having the same issue. Works beautifully then all of a sudden stops working. Tried reinstalling/rebooting etc.

The best thing to do is to check SpamSieve’s log and see if it says those messages were “Predicted: Spam”. If so, contact Airmail’s technical support and tell them what you see in the Operations window for the messages that were not filtered.

I am still having the same issue with Airmail. I have to run OSX Mail in the background to catch spam after Airmail quits working. As Michael noted, the Airmail log (at least for me) does in fact predict emails as spam, but for some reason stops moving them to the spam folder. I’ve notified Airmail tech support, and they are now aware of this.

Airmail Support
How do you contact airmail support. I visited their site but can’t seem to find an email or forum such as this. Would like to add to the list of people having problems.

Thanks