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Why has Thunderbird deleted all my emails while downloading one new mail tonight? And how can I trust it not to do so again?

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so, three days ago I reinstalled Windows 10, Firefox and Thunderbird, which meant losing every email older than 30 days (as far back as my ISP keeps them on the webmail). Tonight, while downloading one email, it deleted all of those 30 days ones completely - not to a trash folder nor archive, nor hidden folder in the profile. is there a way to get them back - i.e. are they somewhere on the HDD - and how can I trust this to not happen randomly again? What the hell did it do? All my settings are to not delete mails automatically, and put them them in trash or archive when I do it manually.

so, three days ago I reinstalled Windows 10, Firefox and Thunderbird, which meant losing every email older than 30 days (as far back as my ISP keeps them on the webmail). Tonight, while downloading one email, it deleted all of those 30 days ones completely - not to a trash folder nor archive, nor hidden folder in the profile. is there a way to get them back - i.e. are they somewhere on the HDD - and how can I trust this to not happen randomly again? What the hell did it do? All my settings are to not delete mails automatically, and put them them in trash or archive when I do it manually.

Chosen solution

Never mind, it seems to have configured itself as IMAP so when I deleted them from the server beause I'd downloaded them, it deleted the downloads here too.

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Chosen Solution

Never mind, it seems to have configured itself as IMAP so when I deleted them from the server beause I'd downloaded them, it deleted the downloads here too.