Strange characters in e-mail

[MomAries]

Hi everyone ,
Does anyone have this problem?? I got strange foreign looking characters in my e-mail. Funny thing is I don't get it with every one on my list, only a couple people.
I had Norton working on my computer for about an hour looking for viruses. Found no viruses or infections.

I wish I could attach an image I did .. Here I copied to show how it looks:
If I still have this issue I will close this sub-account and open a new one. � Its gonna be a huge hassle but if I have to� I have to...
PLEASE� reply to this� mail so I see if the issue is solved.
Funny thing is -� I sent a few� mails to my gmail account,� and believe it or not there were no characters at all in any of those mails! .�

Norton said it could be my server issue ..
Any idea how to rid of these messages? They are annoying!
Thanks.

[tanstaafl]

Its not due to a virus or malware, its probably a problem with the character encoding. The message probably has a mixture of 7 and 8 bit characters and some 8 bit characters are not getting mapped to something sensible.

Try setting view -> text encoding -> Unicode. If that doesn't help use Control-U or view -> message source and copy and paste the content of the first Content-Type: header you find (it should be near the Date: header) so that we can see what text encoding was used. Example: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8

http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic ... 05&hilit=½

[MomAries]

Its not due to a virus or malware, its probably a problem with the character encoding. The message probably has a mixture of 7 and 8 bit characters and some 8 bit characters are not getting mapped to something sensible.

Try setting view -> text encoding -> Unicode. If that doesn't help use Control-U or view -> message source and copy and paste the content of the first Content-Type: header you find (it should be near the Date: header) so that we can see what text encoding was used. Example: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8

http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic ... 05&hilit=½

Since I did not know the nature of this problem I had Norton to check my computer anyway. It sure doesn't help. WHY did it happen all of the sudden is beyond me. I have not change encoding for ages! I now changed encoding to Unicode to experiment even before reading your message. . Hope it will help.
If not I will follow your advice with View / CTRL-U.
But I wonder why I only see these characters with two people out of my mailing list?? Only two people. Does it depend which Window is used, or what?? I use Window 7. The person whose e-mail also gives characters uses W10. I forgot what the other guy is using...
Thanks a bunch.

[tanstaafl]

It doesn't matter what version of Windows you or the sender are using. You might have had encoding set to ISO-8859-1 which would work fine until you got a message from somebody who for some reason needed to use some characters that it couldn't represent. For example the euro sign € . Or used a email client that had different defaults due to that is what everybody as that company used etc.

[MomAries]

It doesn't matter what version of Windows you or the sender are using. You might have had encoding set to ISO-8859-1 which would work fine until you got a message from somebody who for some reason needed to use some characters that it couldn't represent. For example the euro sign € . Or used a email client that had different defaults due to that is what everybody as that company used etc.

Or thats sucks . I had NEVER had this situation before... Not good....
I don't have high hopes after changing to Unicode... First it doesn't hold. It changes to Western eventually. Second it gave me some different in the text: a questionmark boxed. Now I still have on Unicode... We will see... If it doesn't help I'll copy/paste here ...

[tanstaafl]

Did setting to unicode help?
If not, what is the contents of the first Content-Type: header?

[MomAries]

Did setting to unicode help?
If not, what is the contents of the first Content-Type: header?

I changed to Unicode a few days ago ..... It did not help. But I changed again yesterday... Don't know yet. Hope people will reply to my mail. Then I find out.

[MomAries]

Did setting to unicode help?
If not, what is the contents of the first Content-Type: header?

I changed to Unicode a few days ago ..... It did not help. But I changed again yesterday... Don't know yet. Hope people will reply to my mail. Then I find out.

I sent a message to myself, there were no characters. I hope to hear from people ....

[MomAries]

Did setting to unicode help?
If not, what is the contents of the first Content-Type: header?

I I went to "display, and Advanced and changed to Unicode in both Incoming and Outcoming mail. I asked a couple people to let me know if they still see the characters.
I might be able to stop them. Keeping fingers crossed.
Thank you tanstaafl.

[MomAries]

It doesn't matter what version of Windows you or the sender are using. You might have had encoding set to ISO-8859-1 which would work fine until you got a message from somebody who for some reason needed to use some characters that it couldn't represent. For example the euro sign € . Or used a email client that had different defaults due to that is what everybody as that company used etc.

I was wrong that there were only two people had the same problem with characters. Turned out there were more!

[MomAries]

Did setting to unicode help?
If not, what is the contents of the first Content-Type: header?

Hi tanstaafl, I am here to say that besides changing to Unicode I also marked the box "When possible use the default text encoding in replies" at the bottom.
I think in combination with Unicode setting it helped.
NO MORE ODD CHARACTERS!
I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'D DO WITHOUT YOU. Thanks a bunch!!!!! Appreciate your help.

[MomAries]

Personally I think Thunderbird has a bug related to text encoding. I have never changed the font to French, Spanish etc... No one sent me mail in other language than English.
I strongly believe the TB update does something weird to font setting, generating these odd characters.