Junk Mail Filtering in Thunderbird
Wouldn't it be nice if Thunderbird could separate your incoming mail
into two piles: junk and not junk? And if it could put all the junk
messages off to the side where they don't bother you? Read on...
One of Thunderbird's optional features is the ability to learn which
messages you consider junk and which are not junk. At first Thunderbird
will make some mistakes, but once you've trained it, you'll find it
very effective. Training involves telling Thunderbird "this message
is junk" or "this message is NOT junk" for a while. Thunderbird
will develop a set of rules based on the messages you label. The more
information you give it, the more accurate it will become.
Here's what you're going to do:
Configure and enable junk mail controls
From Thunderbird's Tools menu select Junk Mail Controls.
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In the drop-down menu next to Configure Junk Settings for
select the account to which you want to apply junk filtering.
This will typically be your name or NetID, but if you use more
than one account in Thunderbird, you'll need to repeat these steps
for each account. (What's an account?)
Click on the Settings tab in the Junk Mail Controls
window.
The first checkbox - Do not mark messages as junk if the
sender is in - lets you "whitelist" messages coming
from addresses you use. (A whitelist is the opposite of a blacklist;
anyone on the whitelist is assumed to not send you junk.) You
can choose to use either your address book or your collected
addresses as the whitelist. ("Collected addresses"
is a list of all addresses you've sent messages to, whether they
appear in your address book or not. This is an option you can
modify. See our Thunderbird Options page
for more information.)
Leave the second checkbox - Trust junk mail headers set by
- unchecked.
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In the Handling section you tell Thunderbird what to do
with junk messages. Make sure there's a check in the checkbox
next to Move incoming messages determined to be junk mail to,
then choose where you want Thunderbird to put those messages.
We recommend sending them to the Junk folder.
For now, leave the Automatically delete junk messages older
than checkbox empty. Later, when you're comfortable that Thunderbird
is correctly identifying junk, you can come back here and turn
this on.
Make sure there's a check in the checkbox next to When I
manually mark messages as Junk, then choose which action you
want Thunderbird to take. We recommend Delete them (you
don't want to look at them, and Thunderbird has learned what it
can from them).
The final checkbox - When displaying HTML messages -
determines whether Thunderbird should hold on to the entire original
message, or whether it should sanitize it, which means deleting
all HTML formatting and external images from it. This is a matter
of personal preference.
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Click on the Adaptive Filter tab.
To turn on the junk filters for the account shown, make sure
there's a check in the Enable adaptive junk mail detection
checkbox.
If you use more than one account in Thunderbird, repeat these
steps for each account where you want junk mail filtering enabled.
(What's an account?)
Later, if you decide you have messed up and confused Thunderbird
about what is and isn't junk, you can click Reset Training
Data to start over, but a word of caution: resetting training
data applies to ALL accounts, not just the one shown, so you'd
have to start over for all your accounts.
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Train Thunderbird
Thunderbird starts out not knowing anything about junk, so you have
to teach it both what is junk and what is not junk. Let's start with
junk.
| Click on a junk message in the message list (or open the message)
and from Thunderbird's Message menu select Mark - As Junk.
You can also click on a message, then click the Junk icon
in Thunderbird's toolbar. Do this for several junk messages. |
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Now take a few minutes to teach it what isn't junk. Click on a message
that is NOT junk, then from Thunderbird's Message menu select
Mark - As Not Junk. Do this for several non-junk messages. (There
is no "unjunk" icon.)
You must teach Thunderbird about both junk and non-junk, or the junk
filters won't work. The more messages you mark as junk or not junk,
the smarter Thunderbird will get.
Reviewing Thunderbird's decisions about junk
For several days after first turning on the junk controls, you'll want
to take a quick look at the messages Thunderbird has decided are junk.
At first it won't be very accurate, and some important messages might
get labelled as junk. This is why we don't tell Thunderbird to just
throw these messages away!
Go to the folder where Thunderbird stores your junk - you specified
this location in the Configuring section
above. If you see any messages that should not be considered junk, use
Tools - Mark - As Not Junk to tell Thunderbird. Similarly, if
you see messages in your Inbox or other folders that you think
are junk, tell Thunderbird. Over time, you should find fewer and fewer
mis-categorized messages.
Last updated:
May 23, 2007
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