Wonder why I don’t use Microsoft Mail and the Outlook email service?

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Last time I checked my watch, it was 2017. Last time I looked at my test machine, tied to a very old @outlook.com account, here’s what I saw: Could so
[See the full post at: Wonder why I don’t use Microsoft Mail and the Outlook email service?]

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I don’t know specifics of what the eMail services you named do behind the scenes, but on the general subject I’d ask the question this way… Do you prefer:

• 100% spam blockage and some legitimate mail being misfiled as spam?
  
• No false positive misfilings and some spam mail to deal with?

From my own perspective, I’d prefer not to have important eMail just blocked from my ever having seen it. Those of us with experience know that eMail isn’t a guaranteed service, but what if a customer writes in with a problem, asking a legitimate question but somehow has his/her eMail misinterpreted by my eMail provider as spam and deleted so that I never see it.

Perhaps I’m a dinosaur because I still care about what my customers think.

It seems to me there is no perfect technical solution to blocking spam, since you simply cannot predict what will be in the next legitimate eMail you receive.

Perhaps it’s a philosophical issue overall… For example, on another front Microsoft’s anti-malware software may rank lower in ratings than many others, but it pretty much never shows a false positive, where others do.

-Noel

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As a follow-up, I have had a live.com eMail account for years in addition to several of my own domain accounts through my web provider and an account through my local ISP. I’m rigorous about locally filing any spam eMails that get as far as my Outlook 2010 client. Mostly it files them automatically, though maybe one or two a week get through to my actual inbox.

I just looked through my local anti-spam folder, which I have not purged since 2015. Number of spam eMails received at my eMail client:

• Main work domain account: 1400 spam eMails
• Catch-all work domain account: 343 spam eMails
• Personal ISP account: 54 spam eMails
• Microsoft live.com account: 0 spam eMails

I have not published my live.com account anywhere online, and I’ve only rarely used it to send eMail. I use my personal ISP account rarely as well, though a little more than my live.com account. By and large I use my main work domain account.

What does this tell us?

That the spam you receive probably has mostly to do with how you’ve used/published your eMail address. My work eMail address is widely published.

A secondary conclusion I could stab at is that Microsoft has never leaked my live.com eMail address to the spammer world. On the other hand, some of the spams from my catchall address imply that Adobe’s account database has been breached.

-Noel

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BobbyB

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Noel Carboni wrote:

imply that Adobe’s account database has been breached.

After the Adobe database breach affected 150 million users, Lastpass.com had created a tool to check email addresses to see if users needed to change their Adobe account passwords (as well as any other account using that same email/password too, incidentally).

It appears to still be working:
https://lastpass.com/adobe/

Adobe has confirmed that hackers infiltrated their network and stole millions of customer emails and encrypted passwords. They have further acknowledged that your password hint, name, encrypted credit card number, card expiration date, and other confidential information may also have been leaked.

NB This is not new, it dates back to October 2013

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Thanks, now that you mention it I did hear about that back when it happened, Kirsty, and I did change my password as I recall. What I’m confirming is that the information has actually been used.

-Noel

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I once helped a consultant that was using a big ISP that started outsourcing its email service to Microsoft. When he sent an email to himself, the email never went through. He was sending using the original smtp of the big ISP, but MS blocked it and put it in a spam folder in a hidden hotmail account. So that was absolutely horrible because many people in my country had this issue of lost emails and didn’t notice them because they were still using the old smtp and they never got an undeliverable message. They just thought that maybe emails were not that reliable.

So lots of customers could write to him, but they would not get any message saying the email didn’t go through and the consultant would not know he received a message because it was in a hidden spam folder in a hotmail account. So to these customers he would just not give a good service, ignoring them and he wasn’t aware of this. It took months for the ISP to realize this problem and fix it. In the meantime, after I found the issue, the consultant had to log online into this hidden hotmail account all the time instead of using the pop account in his local Outlook to make sure he didn’t miss an email.

I can’t believe Microsoft didn’t notice they were constantly blocking the smtp of their own huge customer ISP.

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HiFlyer, Noel Carboni

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Oh so that’s what the Mail App looks like

However I do use Outlook Mail via Edge. This morning I was rudely greeted in that web page by a split of my Inbox into Focused and Other

It took awhile for me to figure out how to turn that off

Click on “Filter v” uncheck “Show focused Inbox” does the trick

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BobbyB

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Regarding using an online eMail client vs. local software running on the computer…

Have you ever examined the web page programming used to access your eMail via your web browser in detail? (you can watch the sites being contacted e.g., through F12 developer tools).

Most web pages – and I’m not saying I know anything at all about outlook.com, because I haven’t ever tried it – deliver scripts that “read” what you’re looking at from your Document Object Model and send the data to companies that look to target advertisements to you. I don’t mean to wail on Google, because they’re not the only ones doing it, but Google’s presence can be seen on almost every web page nowadays – including these here on askwoody.com – if you haven’t blocked them.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t think I want my web browser reading what’s in my eMail and sending info about it to anyone.

-Noel

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BobbyB, Elly

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Noel Carboni wrote:

Have you ever examined the web page programming used to access your eMail via your web browser in detail?

Only to the point of killing off the advertising that’s shown in the right panel so that I could block the noise. Naturally it has to be blinking, scrolling or running a video. It certainly drew my attention alright, but not in the way they’d wanted. My attention was focused like a knife to stopping from it from ever running again. I later found that the notification and help button display in the right panel too which hides it, however I have no reason to restore access to these advertising hosts that I had blocked as a result:

127.0.0.1 ad.doubleclick.net
127.0.0.1 ol.at.atwola.com
127.0.0.1 secure.adnxs.com
127.0.0.1 secure-lax.adnxs.com
127.0.0.1 choices.truste.com
127.0.0.1 choices-or.truste.com
127.0.0.1 secure-ds.serving-sys.com
127.0.0.1 tps10244.doubleverify.com
127.0.0.1 sb.scorecardresearch.com
127.0.0.1 ad.turn.com
127.0.0.1 r.turn.com
127.0.0.1 images.taboola.com
127.0.0.1 trc.taboola.com

Otherwise I pay no attention to what Microsoft does on its Outlook Mail web page. Since they are handling the mail already I simply assume it’s in the public domain and don’t expect it to be secure.
I use the safe senders list to filter out junk mail from my Inbox. So junk mail always goes into the Junk Mail folder where it’s easy to spot and where it never gets opened at all. BTW, Outlook Mail does not run scripts or display images from a message which is opened in the Junk Mail folder. Glancing at the titles tells me right away that it’s junk mail and so I just clear the entire Junk Mail folder. If I’m curious about a message, I use the message source option to examine it.
Personally, I find all this advertising bizarre. On TV, I just use it as a signal to get up and walk away, look out the window, etc. If I want to, I’ll have fun looking at the background or see how it’s constructed. To me it’s just sign that someone is spending a whole lot of money trying to sell a product–the cost of which is rarely mentioned–but definitely has that advertising cost built into it. It most certainly does not cause me to want to have it–a behavior which the advertisers are apparently attempting to foster.

HP Compaq 6000 Pro SFF PC / Windows 10 Pro / 22H2
Intel®Core™2 “Wolfdale” E8400 3.0 GHz / 8.00 GB
HP ProDesk 400 G5 SFF PC / Windows 11 Pro / 23H2
Intel®Core™ “Coffee Lake” i3-8100 3.6 GHz / 16.00 GB

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HiFlyer, Karlston, BobbyB, Noel Carboni

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EyesOnWindows wrote:

…I find all this advertising…

We think a lot alike. I have often wondered whether most folks feel the same way, though. Do they just not prefer ads but consider it a necessary evil or do they regard advertising with as much contempt as I/we do? I have even encountered the occasional person who claims to like targeted ads because they take them to places to get products they’re actually interested in.

Bravo to you for embracing blacklisting sites. I believe it’s an approach that’s all too often missed in setting up security on modern systems. I suggest using 0.0.0.0 instead of 127.0.0.1 in your hosts file though, for a generally cleaner abort of attempted communications.

My own blacklists are much larger than the one you listed to cover most tracking and ad-delivery sites, though. My list of specific blocked servers (used by my DNS server proxy) has around 60,000 entries, and more importantly my wildcarded list is upwards of 30,000 entries with such broadly sweeping entries as ad.*, ads.*, *tracking*.*, etc. in it. Unfortunately Windows can’t do wildcarding via the hosts file.

-Noel

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Karlston

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I block ads in a similar way, but at the router. That way it’s done at a single spot and works for all devices, including mobile devices like iPads, smartphones, etc.

Most routers have a “Access Restriction” option like in the screenie below from my router’s Tomato firmware…

http://karlston.com.au/AccessRestriction.jpg

I also run the Firefox addons “AdBlock Plus” and “Element Hiding Helper for AdBlock Plus”.

Hanlon's Razor: Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.

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… but please don’t forget that more than 80% of our meager income is from ads … without ads, I couldn’t afford to keep the electricity going.

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Karlston

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I hear you Woody, here’s a compromise…

Am changing my router blocking to only display your site’s ad servers on my main PC. I rarely access your site on other devices, but can’t/won’t open the ad servers up to all devices.

Have to add that I’m a monthly Patreon supporter.

Hanlon's Razor: Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.

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woody, satrow, Noel Carboni, Kirsty

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woody wrote:

… but please don’t forget that more than 80% of our meager income is from ads … without ads, I couldn’t afford to keep the electricity going.

And that’s why I donate.

No way am I going to allow ANY ads from any site. Sorry Woody, but even your site isn’t worth the risk nor aggravation ads bring.

-Noel

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Karlston, woody, satrow, Kirsty

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Thanks to both of you. It does make a difference!

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Since 2008 we have adopted a 3 tier email system based on importance (never divulged online or elsewhere) to expected spam.

None to hardly any spam in the tier 1, few and far between in tier 2 and expected junk in tier 3. Occasionally use disposable emails for registrations etc..

Our system works as intended and purge once a month on patch tuesday

Thoughts on this method: Might as well get rid of crud on patch Tuesday, as MS usually sends us more for our Operating Systems on that date.

 

Windows - commercial by definition and now function...

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About half my 150 client computers use Windows Live Mail. Most the 2011 version which is superior to the 2012 version because they screwed up groups in the 2012. The 2012 version was further messed up earlier by a bunch of defective windows updates. The 2011 version was not messed with because it was out of Microsoft service — a godsend.

The principle reason they use WLM is that webmail has become such a distraction and pig sty. It is continually changing. Things keep being re-designed. Very confusing.

WLM works really well.

However, because of Microsoft’s messing with email, most of my clients who previously had Microsoft serviced accounts, have dropped them and started up new Gmail accounts.

I should add one more thing. I am dealing with this a lot right now. Yahoo has recently made changes such that pdf, pictures, and now videos are corrupted so that WLM cannot use them. Consequently many of them are shifting away from Yahoo to Gmail.

Gmail is winning this out of the foolishness of Microsoft and Yahoo.

Very few of my clients use Outlook. In fact, WLM has just about all the features of Outlook but is free and not being messed up any longer.

WLM is the child of Outlook Express, which became Windows Mail, which became Windows Live Mail. WLM is much improved. One of the really big improvements is the fact that individual emails are not stored in a database format as does Outlook Express, windows mail and Outlook. They are stored as individual files. That database storage system caused numerous problems.

WLM just works well every day, all day.

By the way, you can no longer find WLM2011 unless you have a friend who saved it.

CT

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HiFlyer, BobbyB

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Gmail never receives any spam? Or you don’t announce it when it happens?

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Gmail does an excellent job of separating my mail into “Important,” “Everything else,” and Spam. It’s very rare that I get spam — certainly nothing on this order. An obvious spam message sent from “email@microsoft.com” titled “Microsoft Account Warning”? C’mon. Microsoft’s Bayesian filters should’ve burped all over that.

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And phishing emails are never received via Gmail, right?:

Everyone Is Falling For This Frighteningly Effective Gmail Scam

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I didn’t say that.

I said – and maintain – that spam filtering in outlook.com is way behind Gmail.com.

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woody wrote:

Gmail does an excellent job of separating my mail into “Important,” “Everything else,” and Spam. It’s very rare that I get spam — certainly nothing on this order. An obvious spam message sent from “email@microsoft.com” titled “Microsoft Account Warning”? C’mon. Microsoft’s Bayesian filters should’ve burped all over that.

How much legitimate eMail do you find in the Spam folder, sorted there by Google?

You’re trying to make the point that Google’s anti-spam system is more sophisticated than Microsoft’s, and I want to believe you, but one or two spam messages isn’t sufficient evidence of that. They don’t tell the whole story. Also, are there settings somewhere in your account setup that allow you to choose the level of anti-spam protection?

-Noel

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Just lately I have been tinkering with Win10 ver 15063 Pro in a VHD. Best thing is with a VHD you can mess around and nothings going to get broken you have always Got your “real” system to go back to.

Some years back I had set up a M$ account on a Win10 machine and uploaded a distinct picture for an account and didnt like the invasiveness of it all Junked that install and went back to my usual M.O. of clean install with local account.

Every time I need missing free Apps I have to log in to the store on an App by App basis to avoid letting the M$ account take over the machine again and up Pop’s the distinct image. Which works fine although the machine remembers your account after logging in  as I guess once in there M$ doesent want to let you go despite what you do.

Springing ahead with Ver 15063 Pro you can go to the store get your free apps with no login to an M$ account. When it comes to checking out the mail & calender/notifications for functionality/use you can set up your mail this way, rather than add to M$ account just enter your account details in “other mail” account and “et Voila” no, apparent, M$ account icon/image appears in any of the usual places. Not sure if that “get around” will work in the new “officially” released version coming soon, yet to try in in 1607 but as a test it really wouldnt be any use as its (M$ acc.) already been logged in to from that OS, and really not sure if it really does keep you out of the gaze of M$’s “all seeing eye” but gives the veneer of apparent privacy.

An as an addendum some Junk files that erroneously went to the “Cloud” were still there from years ago.

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Here’s another one. Sent to my @outlook.com account, nominally from bangkekuy@calledakvoty.onmicrosoft.com, titled “AppIe Support” (that’s a capital “I” in “AppIe”). Please tell me how the Outlook.com and UWP Mail spam filters missed this.

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SQLRich

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UWP Mail doesn’t have a spam filter.

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Yes it does – the spam filter deposits offending mail in the Junk Email folder.

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Outlook.com does that, not the Mail app.

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I didn’t realize that. (Also see NetDev’s comment below.)

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I have a longstanding hotmail account which now runs on outlook.com

Today, without any warning, I logged on and my inbox had been split in 2,  from a single inbox to a dual one, one labeled Focused and one labeled Other.

Of course this wonderful new feature was forced on me unilaterally by Microsoft and I had to try and work out how to get rid of it, which I have now done. Of course it would be waaay too much effort for them to tell me about this new feature and ask me if I wanted it before changing my Inbox.

What is wrong with these b***** people?

Windows 10 Home 22H2, Acer Aspire TC-1660 desktop + LibreOffice, non-techie

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You are using the product of a company who doesn’t care. Your best next step is to change providers.

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True, but to which one? Gmail, so Google can hoover up even more of my data? Is there any provider that can be trusted out there?

Windows 10 Home 22H2, Acer Aspire TC-1660 desktop + LibreOffice, non-techie

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samak wrote:

True, but to which one? Gmail, so Google can hoover up even more of my data? Is there any provider that can be trusted out there?

I use Gmail as my public profile account, another one as a throw-away account . . . but for my real email address I use a paid hosting service with advanced spam/virus protection on their side.  It’s not cheap: costs around 130/year.  There are less expensive options too, (Hotmail’s paid plans) and much more expensive methods (own your own email server.)

Remember:  if you’re not paying for a product, you ARE the product.

Oh, and a comment on something I saw earlier:

“b” said:

b wrote:

Outlook.com does that, not the Mail app.

This is quite true, and is true for most of the current free email providers.  They do most of the junk email sorting at the server side.  If you own and use Outlook, it also does some of this sorting, but much of the junk email that’s not deleted outright before you see it is moved before you download it.  The built in Windows Mail app has almost NO protections of any kind.

~ Group "Weekend" ~

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I use Network Solutions for my main email. They do an excellent job. Their SPAM filters are top notch. I have used the same address for 15 years with them. Cost is $175 for FIVE years. I have to say their service is flawless and well supported.

They manage the .name extension. You can have (if someone else does not already have it) your own name as your email address.

CT

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I trust Outlook just enough that I use Outlook 2010 for my Gmail account!

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