Mail app wiped 23,000 emails from my inbox

[maxpayne.co.uk]

Well, this is awkward. I use my @btinternet.com email on two devices: webmail on desktop and IMAP on iOS Mail app. I have an iPhone 8 Plus.

Email had been working perfectly ever since I owned a 3GS back in 2009. Then suddenly, all emails beyond a few weeks, all the way back to 2012, have been wiped. 23,000 of them. They are mostly business emails that I always refer back to and some personal so I am pretty f-d off. Emails in folders are not affected, just the inbox. The emails are nowhere to be found in deleted.

I immediately called BT and after experiencing a craptastically slow customer service, they phoned me back with "The delete command was issued from an iPhone 8". I certainly did not do this. The phone was on 16.3.1 when it happened and had been installed on my phone for many weeks on the date the emails were removed.

So basically, how the hell has this happened? How can Mail just eradicate all those emails through IMAP? Has it happened to anyone before? Or are BT just taking me for a ride?

 

[Slartibart]

what are the IMAP settings on the btinternet.com-account? Are there any emails “left” in your inbox, e.g. just the ones from the last 30 days?

 

[laptech]

If you try to find fault with either Apple or BT I think you will find that both companies will tell you that if the emails in your inbox were of such importance to you that you should have archived them (move them to a folder).

The ONLY way you are going to be able to lay blame on the mail app is if all your inbox messages got deleted the moment you updated iOS and opened the mail app. If you have been using the mail app for some time since the update then it is very doubtful that the mail app itself is at fault.

As for BT, the mail server admins will be able to look at the mail server logs for your account to see the times you logged in and logged off from your mail account, the email traffic going in and out of your account (mail received and mail sent), the logs will also show if you created folders and what was moved into those folders and yes they would also know if emails were deleted from the account, on what day and what time. Therefore, if BT are saying a delete instruction was sent from an iphone 8 then go back to them and ask them what day and what time was the delete instruction sent. BT will have no problem giving you that information if what they are telling you is genuine because if the fault is with BT then they will make excuses why they cannot give you that specific information and that is a red flag basically telling you BT is at fault. Your the account holder so if BT start saying things like they cannot give out such information (when delete instruction was sent) or due to security and privacy reasons they cannot give that information out over the phone (to the account holder) then you will know BT are covering up something because it will be there in the server logs for your account as to when the emails were deleted because this would allow to piece together a time frame as to what you was doing at the time the request came in for the emails to be deleted.

 

[George Dawes]

I had a real problem a few years ago with an iPhone and it's swipe feature - sent all of them accidentally to junk , what a nightmare sorting that out !!

I guess frequent backups and use iCloud is the answer ?? wouldn't rely on BT for anything from experience

They are good at sending out bills , I'll give 'em that !!

 

[maxpayne.co.uk]

what are the IMAP settings on the btinternet.com-account? Are there any emails “left” in your inbox, e.g. just the ones from the last 30 days?

Yes, anything before the 18th March has gone. I didn't realise probably for about a week because I'm only checking the top set of emails.

Laptech, I'm expecting the full on excuses to roll out. I've already been told the date the command was sent. I need to get the time from them and a few other details so I know exactly when it happened. My only question is why.

I did not execute the command. If I did, I'd have to go very far out of my way to select 23,000 emails and press the delete button. Even if I did that, why would it keep the last months worth of emails?

 

[laptech]

Yes, anything before the 18th March has gone. I didn't realise probably for about a week because I'm only checking the top set of emails.

Laptech, I'm expecting the full on excuses to roll out. I've already been told the date the command was sent. I need to get the time from them and a few other details so I know exactly when it happened. My only question is why.

I did not execute the command. If I did, I'd have to go very far out of my way to select 23,000 emails and press the delete button. Even if I did that, why would it keep the last months worth of emails?

Sometimes email apps have settings that dictate how long messages should stay in the inbox before they become automatically deleted. The annoying thing is this setting can come as default and if a person is non the wiser they can open up the email app and find emails beyond a certain date have been automatically deleted. This happened to me with Microsoft Outlook. There was a deep down in the settings tick box for having outook automatically delete emails in the inbox after x amount of days. I wonder if your email app has such a setting.

Also , have you eliminated the possibility that someone else deleted the emails. You know the day the emails was deleted so was your iphone in your possession the whole day? was it ever out of your sight even for a few minutes?

 

[Slartibart]

Yes, anything before the 18th March has gone. I didn't realise probably for about a week because I'm only checking the top set of emails.

Well, as far as I can see there is no way to change IMAP settings in Apple’s Mail in iOS/iPadOS (or is there?). That the “delete” was initiated from the iPhone looks like coincidence - the IMAP-settings were changed somewhere else from “keep forever” to “keep last/delete after 30 days” (or smilar) - or does the setting say “keep forever” on the btinternet-mail account-site? Can you kindly check (e.g. via web interface)?
If the setting is set to keep messages for unlimited time on the IMAP-server, how could any Mail program issue a delete? Something to ask btinternet if that is indeed the case.
Or did you change to a new IMAP host server?

 

[maxpayne.co.uk]

Also , have you eliminated the possibility that someone else deleted the emails. You know the day the emails was deleted so was your iphone in your possession the whole day? was it ever out of your sight even for a few minutes?

The only user of the phone is me. Nobody else has access to it.

Well, as far as I can see there is no way to change IMAP settings in Apple’s Mail in iOS/iPadOS (or is there?). That the “delete” was initiated from the iPhone looks like coincidence - the IMAP-settings were changed somewhere else from “keep forever” to “keep last/delete after 30 days” (or smilar) - or does the setting say “keep forever” on the btinternet-mail account-site? Can you kindly check (e.g. via web interface)?
If the setting is set to keep messages for unlimited time on the IMAP-server, how could any Mail program issue a delete? Something to ask btinternet if that is indeed the case.
Or did you change to a new IMAP host server?

There are no settings like this. Only the option to sync the last 30 days but that doesn't remove them. I did not change any server settings or Mail client settings.

I have managed to obtain the log file for this. Here's a snippet of what I have.

20230319 052650170+0000,  cmd=8 UID STORE 458751:458752 +FLAGS.SILENT (\Deleted), IP=90.255.194.161, client=iPhone Mail-20D67
20230319 121747697+0000,  cmd=26 UID STORE 61023,61028,61031:61032,61034:61036,61038,61043:61044,61046:61047,61050,61056:61057,61059:61061,61063,61065:61067,61069,61073,61075,61079,61081:61083,61087,61090:61093,61096,61098:61100,61102:61104,61106,61108:61109,61113:61114,61117:61118,61... +FLAGS.SILENT (\Deleted), IP=90.255.194.161, client=iPhone Mail-20D67
20230319 121747883+0000,  cmd=27 UID STORE 61218:61219,61222:61228,61230,61236,61240:61242,61244,61247,61250:61254,61256,61258,61260:61262,61264:61265,61267,61270,61272,61277:61278,61281:61282,61286,61288:61293,61299:61300,61302:61303,61310,61314,61317,61319:61329,61338,61341:61345,61... +FLAGS.SILENT (\Deleted), IP=90.255.194.161, client=iPhone Mail-20D67
20230319 121748809+0000,  cmd=28 UID STORE 61432,61435,61439:61440,61442:61443,61445:61449,61451,61454:61457,61462,61466:61467,61473,61476:61478,61482,61485,61492:61494,61498,61501,61504,61506,61509,61511:61512,61514:61515,61519:61520,61524,61526:61528,61530:61537,61540,61542:61545,61... +FLAGS.SILENT (\Deleted), IP=90.255.194.161, client=iPhone Mail-20D67
20230319 121749065+0000,  cmd=32 UID STORE 61666:61667,61669:61670,61672,61674:61675,61679:61681,61683,61688,61690:61691,61700:61706,61709:61711,61718,61720,61722,61725,61727,61731:61732,61734:61737,61739,61741:61742,61746,61749:61751,61753,61760:61762,61764,61768,61773,61781:61783,61... +FLAGS.SILENT (\Deleted), IP=90.255.194.161, client=iPhone Mail-20D67