Safe Sender stopped working... cannot fix

[Rich Roller]

WinXP sp2 w/ Outlook 2003 sp3: Junk E-mail Filter was used for many years
with good success. Then sometime in 2008 (late summer?) it stopped working
right. Specifically the Safe Sender mechanism is broken, resulting in
false-positives.

Settings: Junk E-mail filtering is on and set to "Low"; Safe Senders has
many addresses in its list, plus "Also trust e-mail from my Contacts" is on
too.

Junk E-mail filtering was fine before... it caught most of spam with
virtually no false-positives, maybe once a month. Now, getting 5-10 false
postives a day, especially from people who are in Contacts.

Things tried which have NOT helped at all:
- Junk E-mail Filtering updated by MSUpdate (this has always been
up-to-date, as it is now)
- Ran Detect & Repair on mailbox/PST
- Add false-positive addresses to the Safe Senders List
- Deleted/recreated the Junk E-mail rule using OutlookSpy add-in (as per
instructions at http://www.outlook-tips.net/howto/fix_junk.htm)

The only other idea I have presently is to upgrade to OL 2007 and hope.
Obviously it did work before in OL 2003 and so you'd think it's fixable
without an upgrade.

Anyone else have this problem or have advice on what might fix it?

TIA,

Rich

 

[Diane Poremsky [MVP]]

upgrade won't fix. Have you tried detect and repair?

How many names on on the safe list? (not including contacts)

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]





EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
(e-mail address removed)

You can access this newsgroup by visiting
http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx or point your
newsreader to msnews.microsoft.com.

 

[Rich Roller]

Thanks for replying Diane.

Yes, as per the OP, I did already try detect & repair, along w/ the other
things listed below.

In my Safe Senders list there are: 5 domains & 66 addresses, so 71 entries
total.

It seems like the problem is localized to Safe Senders mechanism. Otherwise
Junk filtering seems to be active and catching lots of spam. My problem is
really just false-positives. Is there some way to attack/fix just the Safe
Sender list mechanism?

-Rich

upgrade won't fix. Have you tried detect and repair?

How many names on on the safe list? (not including contacts)

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]





EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
(e-mail address removed)

You can access this newsgroup by visiting
http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx or point your
newsreader to msnews.microsoft.com.

WinXP sp2 w/ Outlook 2003 sp3: Junk E-mail Filter was used for many years
with good success. Then sometime in 2008 (late summer?) it stopped
working right. Specifically the Safe Sender mechanism is broken,
resulting in false-positives.

Settings: Junk E-mail filtering is on and set to "Low"; Safe Senders has
many addresses in its list, plus "Also trust e-mail from my Contacts" is
on too.

Junk E-mail filtering was fine before... it caught most of spam with
virtually no false-positives, maybe once a month. Now, getting 5-10
false postives a day, especially from people who are in Contacts.

Things I've tried which have NOT helped at all:
- Junk E-mail Filtering updated by MSUpdate (this has always been
up-to-date, as it is now)
- Ran Detect & Repair on mailbox/PST
- Add false-positive addresses to the Safe Senders List
- Deleted/recreated the Junk E-mail rule using OutlookSpy add-in (as per
instructions at http://www.outlook-tips.net/howto/fix_junk.htm)

The only other idea I have presently is to upgrade to OL 2007 and hope.
Obviously it did work before in OL 2003 and so you'd think it's fixable
without an upgrade.

Anyone else have this problem or have advice on what might fix it?

TIA,

Rich

 

[Diane Poremsky [MVP]]

Ok, you are well under the max. for the safe/blocked list. I'm not aware of
any way to 'fix' the list, other than to start over. Export it and go over
the addresses - see if there are any oddities, like extra spaces - the
delete the list from junk mail and restart outlook. Import the list.

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]





EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
(e-mail address removed)

You can access this newsgroup by visiting
http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx or point your
newsreader to msnews.microsoft.com.

Thanks for replying Diane.

Yes, as per the OP, I did already try detect & repair, along w/ the other
things listed below.

In my Safe Senders list there are: 5 domains & 66 addresses, so 71 entries
total.

It seems like the problem is localized to Safe Senders mechanism.
Otherwise Junk filtering seems to be active and catching lots of spam. My
problem is really just false-positives. Is there some way to attack/fix
just the Safe Sender list mechanism?

-Rich

upgrade won't fix. Have you tried detect and repair?

How many names on on the safe list? (not including contacts)

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]





EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
(e-mail address removed)

You can access this newsgroup by visiting
http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx or point
your newsreader to msnews.microsoft.com.

WinXP sp2 w/ Outlook 2003 sp3: Junk E-mail Filter was used for many
years with good success. Then sometime in 2008 (late summer?) it
stopped working right. Specifically the Safe Sender mechanism is
broken, resulting in false-positives.

Settings: Junk E-mail filtering is on and set to "Low"; Safe Senders has
many addresses in its list, plus "Also trust e-mail from my Contacts" is
on too.

Junk E-mail filtering was fine before... it caught most of spam with
virtually no false-positives, maybe once a month. Now, getting 5-10
false postives a day, especially from people who are in Contacts.

Things I've tried which have NOT helped at all:
- Junk E-mail Filtering updated by MSUpdate (this has always been
up-to-date, as it is now)
- Ran Detect & Repair on mailbox/PST
- Add false-positive addresses to the Safe Senders List
- Deleted/recreated the Junk E-mail rule using OutlookSpy add-in (as per
instructions at http://www.outlook-tips.net/howto/fix_junk.htm)

The only other idea I have presently is to upgrade to OL 2007 and hope.
Obviously it did work before in OL 2003 and so you'd think it's fixable
without an upgrade.

Anyone else have this problem or have advice on what might fix it?

TIA,

Rich

 

[Rich Roller]

I will try deleting & recreating the Safe list but why am I not super
optimistic it'll fix my problem?

Diane, I'm glad you happened to respond because it was your original website
advice which gave me hope that deleting the junk mail rule would do the
trick. (unfortunately it didn't) Beyond that I was hoping that if anyone
knew of how to fix this bug (I'm pretty sure that's what it is) then it'd be
you. Still haven't given up all hope!

-Rich

Ok, you are well under the max. for the safe/blocked list. I'm not aware
of any way to 'fix' the list, other than to start over. Export it and go
over the addresses - see if there are any oddities, like extra spaces -
the delete the list from junk mail and restart outlook. Import the list.

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]





EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
(e-mail address removed)

You can access this newsgroup by visiting
http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx or point your
newsreader to msnews.microsoft.com.

Thanks for replying Diane.

Yes, as per the OP, I did already try detect & repair, along w/ the other
things listed below.

In my Safe Senders list there are: 5 domains & 66 addresses, so 71
entries total.

It seems like the problem is localized to Safe Senders mechanism.
Otherwise Junk filtering seems to be active and catching lots of spam.
My problem is really just false-positives. Is there some way to
attack/fix just the Safe Sender list mechanism?

-Rich

upgrade won't fix. Have you tried detect and repair?

How many names on on the safe list? (not including contacts)

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]





EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
(e-mail address removed)

You can access this newsgroup by visiting
http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx or point
your newsreader to msnews.microsoft.com.


WinXP sp2 w/ Outlook 2003 sp3: Junk E-mail Filter was used for many
years with good success. Then sometime in 2008 (late summer?) it
stopped working right. Specifically the Safe Sender mechanism is
broken, resulting in false-positives.

Settings: Junk E-mail filtering is on and set to "Low"; Safe Senders
has many addresses in its list, plus "Also trust e-mail from my
Contacts" is on too.

Junk E-mail filtering was fine before... it caught most of spam with
virtually no false-positives, maybe once a month. Now, getting 5-10
false postives a day, especially from people who are in Contacts.

Things I've tried which have NOT helped at all:
- Junk E-mail Filtering updated by MSUpdate (this has always been
up-to-date, as it is now)
- Ran Detect & Repair on mailbox/PST
- Add false-positive addresses to the Safe Senders List
- Deleted/recreated the Junk E-mail rule using OutlookSpy add-in (as
per instructions at http://www.outlook-tips.net/howto/fix_junk.htm)

The only other idea I have presently is to upgrade to OL 2007 and hope.
Obviously it did work before in OL 2003 and so you'd think it's fixable
without an upgrade.

Anyone else have this problem or have advice on what might fix it?

TIA,

Rich

 

[Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook]]

I will try deleting & recreating the Safe list but why am I not super
optimistic it'll fix my problem?

Also take a look at this: http://www.outlook-tips.net/howto/fix_junk.htm