Windows Live Mail 2012 not Blocking Hotmail Images

Anonymous
2013-03-22T17:45:35+00:00

Hi everyone, I've been running Windows 8 Enterprise with Windows Live Mail 2012 since the fall.  I have Windows Live Mail configured for 13 email accounts - most are IMAP accounts, a couple Yahoo! accounts, a GMail account, and a Hotmail account (@hotmail.com).  I have "Block images and other external content in HTML email" checked in the Safety Options on the Security tab.  It works exactly the way it should so I get an email with images and they're blocked unless I click "Show images" on the message or if they are already in my Safe Senders list.

However, this works for all my accounts in Live Mail except my Hotmail account.  For some reason ALL images just show up and are not blocked.  Most of these are spam, so this is really bad because of the potential of web beacons letting the spammers know that the address is legit.  I can't figure out what's going on with this.  I had cleared all my Safe Senders to start from scratch just in case that was the issue, but it made no difference.

If I log into the Hotmail website (or Outlook.com), the option for "Block attachments, pictures, and links for anyone not in my safe senders list" is checked and the same messages that are showing images in Windows Live Mail are being correctly blocked on the websites.

So the problem has to be something on the Windows Live Mail client specific to Hotmail accounts (or at least mine), but I'm just not sure where to go next.

Any thoughts?

Thanks,

-- Jim

Windows for home | Other | Email and communications

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  1. Anonymous
    2013-07-30T22:30:18+00:00

    Try turning off HTML emails in WL Mail,

     That would work.  Do you know how to do that?  I searched, but couldn't find a setting for it.

    I don't really want to switch to using GMail for everything, since I have a lot of accounts already setup, but its looking like a better option every day.

    A lot of pain up front > little pain every day.

    Thank you for your insight.

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  2. Anonymous
    2013-03-24T16:54:27+00:00

    I’m also looking for an answer.  My WL Mail blocks images in some messages only, pretty much like how Hotmail/Outlook.com used to work, although Outlook.com does not have this problem anymore.

    Anecdotally, it seems that the issue have something to do with the X-Message-Delivery header, which Hotmail/Outlook.com adds to inbound messages—it is my observation that the vast majority of messages have the value V=1.1;us=0;l=1;a=1;D=1;GD=1;SCL=0, while those few that do have images blocked have V=1.1;us=0;l=0;a=1;D=1;GD=1;SCL=0.  (The actual values are base64-encoded.)

    While it is not a valid proof, you may want to check if …

    • … messages with which image blocking works have an X-Message-Delivery value that begins with Vj0xLjE7dXM9MDtsPTA7; and
    • … messages with which image blocking does not work have an X-Message-Delivery value that begins with Vj0xLjE7dXM9MDtsPTE7.

    If this is indeed how it works, I guess only Microsoft will be able to fix this problem.  (I tried tweaking %LocalAppData%\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail\SAS.Rule but the rule set SafetyLevelDetermination does not seem to affect image downloading behavior.)

    P.S.  The Windows 8 Mail app (version 16.4.4406.1205) has a similar issue—images may appear blocked, but downloading still occurs (cf. http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-ecoms/windows-8-mail-loads-external-images-even-if/4d777c80-3922-41b9-af0f-7dba938eae98).

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  3. Anonymous
    2013-03-29T03:06:43+00:00

    Hi JC,

    Thank you for providing us those information. We would like you to also verify if reconfiguring the account will make any changes to this issue. You can check the link I have given to Jim for the steps.

    We appreciate your reply.

    Thanks.

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  4. Anonymous
    2013-03-29T03:03:56+00:00

    Hi Jim,

    Thank you for providing us those screen shots.

    Let us isolate the issue first and check if there is a problem with the sync of the email account that might be causing this. To check this, please reconfigure your account on Live Mail. You can follow the steps in this link:

    How do I add an account to Windows Live Mail?

    Please let us know the results.

    Thanks.

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  5. Anonymous
    2013-03-27T19:31:30+00:00

    Hi Jim,

    I'm sorry for the delayed reply.

    Please help us investigate your issue about not being able to properly view images on your Hotmail account when accessed through Windows Live Mail 2012. I'd like to have the following info from you:

    • Affected email account.
    • Screenshot.

    You may provide these details in the private message area I have for you. Please sign in using a Microsoft account and click Private Messages tab across All Replies.

    We look forward to receiving your reply.

    Thank you.

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