Spam emails with no sender address

I have the exact same problem. Something in Rule execution has changed.

My Rule is suppose to apply to incoming messages - this is now failing (has been for a year at least). Apparently inbound mail determined as Junk mail bypasses any rule and is deposited in the Junk Folder. I can go to Junk folder, manually run the Rule to move or delete and the Rule works. The rub here is that the Rule used to work automatically.

I've complained to MS about this and had a support case opened. MS said they would get back to me. That was a year ago. MS never has. Pinged them on it and no response.

Perhaps if there are more complaints about Rules not working - maybe MS will actually fix Rules to the way they used to work.

Since rule actions are based on incoming messages and messages already in your Inbox, I don't see any way of applying them to any other folder. HOWEVER, you COULD build a VBscript that access a specific folder and applies deletions/moves of your own design. Note that there is a STEEP learning curve for VBscript in Outlook. I did this once when I wanted a rule that would delete a message when it had a specific combination of words found (not just a simple string with both words . (So it would delete a message with A .... B where the ... could be ANYTHING) because Rules don't allow for wildcards (the "....").

Two things:

1: The rule seems to work on the Inbox. I want it to work on my Junk folder. Can that be done?

2. It does not appear to run automatically. It seems I have to jump start the rule to make it run?

I agree and I'm no expert. It's a short term step for a long term problem. It shouldn't be this hard to avoid spam.

I'm using the bulk option "Block unsafe addresses" (in the junk email option).Still, unwanted "same subject" emails still get through in my regular inbox, not as often as before but it still happens.

It is annoying and a big time waste. I have to check the junk email for expected emails and change the status to "not junk"

But, at least most of the junk is funneled into the junk folder and I can delete them all at once instead of one at a time.
If you find something better. Please share.

This is still going on, I'm receiving tens of emails a day in my inbox with the same content but different words where the email address should be, things like Temu Pallets, Mcafee, Gummies, and more. I've tried rules with no luck, marking as junk or phishing does nothing but move it to junk mail. Why can't Hotmail/outlook/live mail just auto block any emails that don't have a visible sender address? it's obviously a flaw in the system that spammers are exploiting, just block ithem entirely, if I'm expecting an email that hasn't arrived I'll just check my junk mail. This is getting rather annoying.