Ask HN: Why can't Gmail auto-delete "100% certain" spam?

1 points by ScottWhigham 15y ago ↗ HN

Sometimes I look in my Gmail's Spam folder and see 100+ Russian emails that are all spam. Why do these even get to me? It makes no sense - they are all 100% spam.

Google surely has algorithms that can show them that 200,000 almost identical emails were sent during x minutes from the same IP. They have the technology to detect it as spam - so why not just auto-delete it? What does Google gain from me even having the option to see these emails?

2 comments

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tjr 15y ago ↗

I don't know Google's reasoning, but as an occasional researcher of spam, I like to be able to see the spam that comes to me. Maybe "auto-delete" would be a good optional setting.

lukesandberg 15y ago ↗

Google does auto delete spam, they just don't do it until a month (i think) after the message arrives. I think that they realize that occasionally they will miss-classify some mail and at least this way you have a chance to catch it. Not every algorithm is perfect.

For instance I received three reminder email to renew my economist subscription the first two were marked important and the third one was spam... who knows why that happened. If spam were auto deleted i would have never known.