Suddenly lots of legitimate email is getting scored as Bayes 99. Any idea why?

Misha · 8 Sep 2011, 03:04 AM

For some reason, just over the past 24 hours or so, it seems like a lot of my legitimate email is getting tagged as BAYES_99 by spamassassin.

I am pretty sure this more or less never happened before: I file all my Bayes_99 email into their own folder, using a Seive script. if i look in that folder- there are no legitimate emails I can identify over the past several weeks. But in the past 24 hours - at least a dozen emails have been identified as "bayes_99".

Does anyone have any idea why this might be happening? I've been using and trainging my Bayes filter for several years, and it normally works great...

Misha · 8 Sep 2011, 03:07 AM

(It looks like this problem started around 5:00 am eastern time this morning. A pretty large number of my emails are being tagged as Bayes_99....)

Misha · 8 Sep 2011, 04:03 AM

Hmm. It looks like most, if not all, of my mail is being tagged as bayes_99. Weird.... I thought it might be some sort of sytem-wide problem. No one else is seeing this? I wonder what might have changed with my account to make this happen.....

davidbstanley · 8 Sep 2011, 04:56 AM

Same for me. All of my mail today has this tag. I posted earlier about blocking of AOL mail - this might be related. It looks like something is broken.

davidbstanley · 8 Sep 2011, 05:08 AM

I had a look at another account that I have access to. It is also showing the same tag:

BAYES_99 3.5, FREEMAIL_FROM 0.001, HTML_MESSAGE 0.001, T_FREEMAIL_DOC_PDF 0.01, BAYES_USED global, SA_VERSION 3.3.1

commute201 · 8 Sep 2011, 06:53 AM

I am noticing this too. Even emails I have sent to friends and family which I Bcced my own Fastmail address, which the sent copy comes back as an incoming email in my Fastmail Inbox are now are getting a minimum spam score of 3.0 as a result of this BAYES 99 problem, whereas most of these before they got a spam score of 1.0 or less. This just started today.

commute201 · 8 Sep 2011, 08:17 AM

Since I am a Full Member with Fastmail, I just opened a support ticket on our multiple user issue with Fastmail technical support. I referenced this forum post in the ticket so they will have more details. I will post again after I receive a response from them.

Berenburger · 8 Sep 2011, 08:31 AM

I hardly receive emails in my spam folder. Today about four with the tag bayes_99.

n5bb · 8 Sep 2011, 11:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by davidbstanley

I had a look at another account that I have access to. It is also showing the same tag:

BAYES_99 3.5, FREEMAIL_FROM 0.001, HTML_MESSAGE 0.001, T_FREEMAIL_DOC_PDF 0.01, BAYES_USED global, SA_VERSION 3.3.1

By the way, that account is using the global Bayes filter, so the spam reporting for that account has no direct affect. The user should follow the instructions at the bottom of the Spam/Virus Protection screen to get better spam filtering. That BAYES_99 was based on the global Bayes filter and not customized for that user.

I just performed some tests using two Fastmail accounts I use:

The account which is using User Bayes spam filtering is working normally.
The account which is using Global Bayes spam filtering is marking messages as BAYES_99 (spam score 3.5). Since the Normal (default) spam protection level only files messages into Junk Mail and marks the subject as spam when the score is greater than or equal to 5.0, messages will have to have additional positive spam tags to me classified as spam when using the default settings.

I have sent Fastmail staff my findings so they can investigate.

Bill

Misha · 8 Sep 2011, 11:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by n5bb

By the way, that account is using the global Bayes filter,

Ah! I had not thought to look at that. Looking at my emails: Around the same time as the bayes filter started misbehaving, it switched from
"BAYES_USED user" to "BAYES_USED global"

Curious.

I'm pretty sure I didn't log on at 5:00 am this morning and tell the Bayes filter to switch the the global db. And even if I did - I don't see why the global bayes DB would want to score most of my incoming mail as Bayes_99. But for now- I will try and see if I can manually re-tell spamasssassin to use my local bayes data and see if that helps...

n5bb · 8 Sep 2011, 12:03 PM

Can you convert 5 AM in your timezone to either New York City (-0400, where the Fastmail servers are located and create their timezone stamps) or GMT?

Bill

Misha · 8 Sep 2011, 12:04 PM

Bill - 5:00 am eastern time (NYC)

Misha · 8 Sep 2011, 12:05 PM

More info: For some reason, when I go to the Spam/Virus Protection page, it tells me:

Num spam learned 8
Num non-spam learned 4804
Bayes database used Global

Now- I've been training this database for years. It should be trained with thousands of spam messages. It looks like it go re-set somehow.... I have thousands and thousand of messages in folders that are supposed to auto-train the bayes DB...

Misha · 8 Sep 2011, 12:50 PM

A little more poking around: 5:00 am was an estimate. It seems like it was within a few minutes of 3:00 am eastern time, my email switched from user-Bayes to global-bayes...

I submitted a support ticket to fastmail this afternoon. No reply yet...

placebo · 8 Sep 2011, 03:52 PM

The spam training on my account has been reset completely. It looks like there's a problem with the individual Bayes databases.

8 Sep 2011, 03:04 AM	#1
Misha Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 178	Suddenly lots of legitimate email is getting scored as Bayes 99. Any idea why? For some reason, just over the past 24 hours or so, it seems like a lot of my legitimate email is getting tagged as BAYES_99 by spamassassin. I am pretty sure this more or less never happened before: I file all my Bayes_99 email into their own folder, using a Seive script. if i look in that folder- there are no legitimate emails I can identify over the past several weeks. But in the past 24 hours - at least a dozen emails have been identified as "bayes_99". Does anyone have any idea why this might be happening? I've been using and trainging my Bayes filter for several years, and it normally works great...

8 Sep 2011, 12:05 PM	#13
Misha Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 178	More info: For some reason, when I go to the Spam/Virus Protection page, it tells me: Num spam learned 8 Num non-spam learned 4804 Bayes database used Global Now- I've been training this database for years. It should be trained with thousands of spam messages. It looks like it go re-set somehow.... I have thousands and thousand of messages in folders that are supposed to auto-train the bayes DB...

8 Sep 2011, 03:07 AM	#2
Misha Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 178	(It looks like this problem started around 5:00 am eastern time this morning. A pretty large number of my emails are being tagged as Bayes_99....)

8 Sep 2011, 04:03 AM	#3
Misha Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 178	Hmm. It looks like most, if not all, of my mail is being tagged as bayes_99. Weird.... I thought it might be some sort of sytem-wide problem. No one else is seeing this? I wonder what might have changed with my account to make this happen.....

8 Sep 2011, 04:56 AM	#4
davidbstanley Cornerstone of the Community Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Kent, UK Posts: 693	Same for me. All of my mail today has this tag. I posted earlier about blocking of AOL mail - this might be related. It looks like something is broken.

8 Sep 2011, 05:08 AM	#5
davidbstanley Cornerstone of the Community Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Kent, UK Posts: 693	I had a look at another account that I have access to. It is also showing the same tag: BAYES_99 3.5, FREEMAIL_FROM 0.001, HTML_MESSAGE 0.001, T_FREEMAIL_DOC_PDF 0.01, BAYES_USED global, SA_VERSION 3.3.1

8 Sep 2011, 06:53 AM	#6
commute201 Junior Member Join Date: May 2009 Posts: 6	I am noticing this too. Even emails I have sent to friends and family which I Bcced my own Fastmail address, which the sent copy comes back as an incoming email in my Fastmail Inbox are now are getting a minimum spam score of 3.0 as a result of this BAYES 99 problem, whereas most of these before they got a spam score of 1.0 or less. This just started today.

8 Sep 2011, 08:17 AM	#7
commute201 Junior Member Join Date: May 2009 Posts: 6	Since I am a Full Member with Fastmail, I just opened a support ticket on our multiple user issue with Fastmail technical support. I referenced this forum post in the ticket so they will have more details. I will post again after I receive a response from them.

8 Sep 2011, 08:31 AM	#8
Berenburger The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: The Netherlands Posts: 2,908	I hardly receive emails in my spam folder. Today about four with the tag bayes_99.

8 Sep 2011, 12:03 PM	#11
n5bb Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: May 2004 Location: Irving, Texas Posts: 8,930	Can you convert 5 AM in your timezone to either New York City (-0400, where the Fastmail servers are located and create their timezone stamps) or GMT? Bill

8 Sep 2011, 12:04 PM	#12
Misha Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 178	Bill - 5:00 am eastern time (NYC)

8 Sep 2011, 12:50 PM	#14
Misha Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 178	A little more poking around: 5:00 am was an estimate. It seems like it was within a few minutes of 3:00 am eastern time, my email switched from user-Bayes to global-bayes... I submitted a support ticket to fastmail this afternoon. No reply yet...

8 Sep 2011, 03:52 PM	#15
placebo Cornerstone of the Community Join Date: Jun 2004 Posts: 743	The spam training on my account has been reset completely. It looks like there's a problem with the individual Bayes databases.