Hotmail’s epic spam fail is the latest headache for Microsoft
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According to recent reports, Microsoft Hotmail (now officially known as Microsoft Outlook) has had some issues with its junk email filtering systems, opening the floodgates to let masses of spam into users’ inboxes.
Users have taken to Twitter to vent their frustrations, but it’s unclear at this point what’s causing the problem. While Microsoft has reached out to some affected individuals on social media with invites to DM to discuss the issue, an official response has yet to come stating that this is the fault of a specific known bug or glitch.
While we don’t have exact numbers on those affected, we can confirm that the problem is widespread – members of the TechRadar team (myself included) are bombarded with spam emails all day long.
Hotmail is also trending on Twitter right now, which must make some Microsoft executives particularly annoyed since these tweeters aren’t even using the correct name.
Is someone else’s hotmail throwing junk mail into their inbox even though the filter is set to the highest privacy setting? Very strange. (Yes, I know, Hotmail is prehistoric – but when you freelance, you always keep the same number and email. So 1996-forever it’s mine)February 20, 2023
Analysis: more problems for large M
Microsoft has had quite a year so far. The big event for the company was the unveiling of its AI tool ChatGPT integrated into the Bing search engine (as well as the Microsoft Edge browser), but it took less than a week for the chatbot to start send unhinged messages to users.
Now the tech giant is in trouble again, with users furious at the deluge of dodgy emails landing in their inboxes. People already are post memes about the alleged failure of the junk filter, with some speculating that someone at Microsoft accidentally pressed a switch they shouldn’t have – we feel the need to say that this is almost certainly not how it works, but it’s still always a funny thought.
In any case, no proper solution is available yet, but we’ll be sure to let you know when Microsoft fixes things. Normally, Outlook/Hotmail allows you to set a certain level of spam protection; set it high and the automated system will aggressively target potential spam emails, though it does carry the risk of actually sending legitimate emails to your junk email folder.
Outlook (like most email platforms) also has the ability to mark specific domains as spam sources, although this is rarely a useful tool as email spammers typically use domain generators to get around such filters. The spam filter issues also disrupt Outlook’s “focused inbox” setting, which should show only very important emails.
We’ve reached out to Microsoft for comment and will update this story when we receive a response.