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               Be Careful When Deleting Conversations in Messages

   Josh Centers

   In a [1]Hacker News thread about Dustin Curtis's locked Apple ID (see
   '[2]The Mystery of Dustin Curtis's Locked Apple ID,' 5 March 2021),
   there were several reports of iMessage accounts being disabled after
   other users inadvertently marked messages from them as spam during
   deletion (swipe left on a message and then tap the trash icon).

   User andrewmcwatters wrote:

     There's a UX defect with Messages right now where if you delete some
     conversations in succession, randomly will a modal popup [sic] and
     ask you if you want to report the contact as spam.

     Some Apple articles will tell you not to worry if you've
     accidentally reported someone as spam, but it actually does
     something. It's not a pedestrian crosswalk button.

     I found this out the hard way when my wife could no longer send or
     receive messages nor sign into Messages and we had to contact Apple
     support. I've accidentally reported tons of people as spam because
     of this stupid Messages experience, and I can only guess that I've
     reported my own wife so many times from clearing all of my Messages
     conversations that they disabled her Messages account.

   He eventually got his wife's iMessage access restored after Apple
   Support granted a 'one-time exception.'

   User rdm_blackhole reported a similar occurrence:

     What a coincidence. My wife had the same issue a few months ago. It
     started with her not being able to send or receive iMessages.

     The worst part was that there was no notification nor warning. Some
     of her friends actually thought that she was mad at them for some
     reason as they would send her messages and she according to them
     would not respond at all.

     From her perspective though she was responding to every message but
     they never got them.

   He also got her iMessage access restored with another 'one-time
   exception.'

   We haven't seen other reports of this, and we can't replicate the
   behavior, so it's likely a rare issue. Regardless, be aware of the
   possibility. The spam-reporting prompt seems to appear only when you
   delete an entire conversation or delete several messages from a single
   conversation. If you regularly delete messages or conversations in
   Messages, read the prompts carefully before responding to them.

   It's not unreasonable that Apple would use the reports of spam messages
   to protect other users from spammers. However, it does open the door to
   abuse by users who would intentionally mark messages from others as
   spam to disable their accounts. That could happen only between people
   who have exchanged a sufficient number of messages, but it's not hard
   to imagine it occurring in an unpleasant divorce or with a disgruntled
   housemate. Let us know in the comments if you've seen the
   spam-reporting prompts or if you or someone you know has had their
   iMessage account suspended by Apple.

References

   Visible links
   1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26310996
   2. https://tidbits.com/2021/03/05/the-mystery-of-dustin-curtiss-locked-apple-id/

   Hidden links:
   3. https://tidbits.com/wp/../uploads/2021/03/Deleting-Messages.jpg

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