Emails before July disappeared.

[gensimpson]

Hi, 

I seem to have lost any emails before the beginning of July. This applies to emails on my Outlook app, my Webmail for TalkTalk, and my iphone email account. 

The only deleted emails on the system are from 2016 to 2020. There are no deleted emails from 2020 to the present. 

Could anyone please advise - are the emails gone for good, or can I recover them?

[Ady-TalkTalk]

Hi gensimpson, we don't have access to your mailboxes I can't see any details of the mailbox except if its live or not. If you've lost the mail and it's not on the old device then I'm afraid they've gone. We advise to make backups as we don't offer a back up service. 

Ady

[gensimpson]

Thanks Gondola.

We have now uploaded our email addresses to the private notes on the profile. 

Nothing further to add - our connections on the Outlook app are definitely IMAP - for both accounts

[Gondola]

If the only connection to the mailboxes is now via Outlook and IMAP secure accounts on your new computer then we'll assume that's working as expected and all online folders will be synchronised to Outlook. Mail in the Inbox will stay online unless you choose to delete it. Mail sent will be synchronised to the online Sent objects folder. Anything you do delete will be synchronised to the online trash folder where it will stay until system deletion after 30 days.

Upgrading the password will have locked out any unauthorised connection(s).

If the former Outlook was set up with POP3 accounts then deleting the software and data on that computer would have erased the saved mail messages that were only on the device and not stored online. This is the common factor for both mailboxes / email accounts. 

You've not yet updated your Community profile as advised.  Please do so as this will avoid delays when TalkTalk pick up this topic.

[gensimpson]

The Outlook app on our computer has set up the talktalk email account automatically. The settings are definitely for an IMAP connection (for both accounts). So, whilst I understand the possible explanation in relation to POP3 connections, I don't think it is relevant in this case.

It would therefore be useful to get an email admin from Talktalk to check this out further.

Many thanks for you advice so far.

[Gondola]

Anything further from your viewpoint about using / not using IMAP email accounts on Outlook or other software?

To help TalkTalk Support please put your TalkTalk email addresses in your Community profile Private notes and save changes.

[Gondola]

I'll certainly ask TalkTalk Support to check and they'll respond right here in Community.

The assumption that mail messages for two mailboxes will remain on the server is true when the mailboxes have IMAP connections or 'Never delete from the server' is set for POP3 connections. If the Outlook incoming server port was 110 or 995 that's a POP3 account and Inbox messages are downloaded and, by default, deleted from the server. Also with POP3 sent messages are not saved to the server but are on the Outlook device. If Outlook on that device has been erased without backing up the Outlook data files then it's taken all the message content with it.

That's my take on why both mailboxes have the same issue with older mail messages. But TalkTalk will ask the email admins to check.

Are both mailboxes now set up with IMAP accounts on Outlook and are they both working normally?

[gensimpson]

I wonder whether I should try and contact talktalk directly. The plot thickens. My husband's account, he is the administrator of the same computer, has also suffered a loss of data. 

One important issue is that we have changed our computer - about a month ago - we had a desktop, and moved everything over to a new minicomputer. We wiped the memory of the old desktop, and set up the new computer, installing microsoft office, etc. But, had assumed that all the emails would have remained on the server. This is the case for gmail - our gmail online account has all of the emails, and also they also appear on the outlook app, and phone email apps. So, no loss of data for gmail. Our main documents are kept on Dropbox and they are still there. 

Strange that this has happened for Talktalk. My husband has lost everything in his inbox before the end of May, and all sent items from after 2018!! Also his deleted emails, (trash), have also largely disappeared. Could this be a problem with the Talktalk servers?!

[Gondola]

Good to know there was nothing obvious found on the security scan. The domain talktalk.com is totally unrelated to TalkTalk the UK ISP. 

Changing the mailbox password is a precautionary action if we assume the former password had been discovered. Sorry to know that you haven't found the missing mail messages. If you don't have a backup then you need to accept that the mail messages are gone. If an unauthorised person has obtained those mail messages then be very cautious when receiving new emails. Scammers may spoof emails from your contacts. 

[gensimpson]

Thanks for this information. This is very concerning - years of emails appear to have disappeared.

I have followed your advice - there were no inward arrows on any of the folders, and there didn't appear to be any defined filter rules.

We have no knowledge of a device setting up a POP3 account. It is interesting that all of the emails on the webmail client, the Outlook app, and the email app on the iphone are all mirrored - in the sense that they have all got no emails before July 3rd. (So, it doesn't appear that any of our devices have downloaded the emails from the webmail)

I have done a scan using Norton and nothing is showing exept a message that one tracker was found in the browsing history - and that was from the website talktalk.com. I am not sure what that means.

If you can think of any other options we have I'd be eager to know...

I have now changed the webmail password. Although this feels like shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted!

[Gondola]

Sign in to webmail and check all folders and sub-folders indicated by an inward facing arrowhead. Whilst there check there are no filter rules defined. What you want to see is no filter rules and no auto-forward. Main Settings menu (triple lines top right desktop browser) > Settings menu item > Mail or Email in the left panel > Filter rules.

The loss of emails from the Inbox folder that are older than 2 weeks is a classic symptom of an email client like Outlook connecting to the mailbox Inbox as a POP3 email account on default settings. This would download all emails from the Inbox and then proceed to delete from the online Inbox all those successfully downloaded to the local device leaving just the emails for the last two weeks in the Inbox. i.e. beginning of July onwards.

Did you recently, in the last few days, set up a new POP3 email account to view or collect your mail messages? The device will hold the downloaded emails. If not you then assume your mailbox password has been compromised.

Scan your devices to identify and remove unexpected viruses, trojans or other malware. This is just a precaution in case you have inadvertently downloaded some password grabbing malware.

Then change and upgrade the mailbox password.

If you don't know who may have set up new mail collection software or service and you do not see the missing mail messages online or on any of your devices then then unwelcome bit of news is that TalkTalk do not offer a backup service. It's up to the user to make their own regular backups for recovery.