This is nothing to do with Thunderbird. You need to figure out how to get your anti virus program to release your inbox.

Okay, there has been a development.

I rebooted my computer. Now I can access my Inbox, but there is only ONE message in it, and that is the message I got from Mozilla telling me I had logged into my account. I had THOUSANDS of emails in there, many of which were important. Can I recover them?

Now, if I can't recover them, how can I get TB to make a backup of every file that comes into my Inbox so that I don't lose my emails again? Thank you.

Clearly I was not clear enough. Your inbox data has been quarantined. In your own words "My computer is made by Hewlett-Packard, and their own virus program told me that a virus in my Inbox had been quarantined." that means your data is gone until you figure out how to make that product unquarantine the data. Posting in a Thunderbird forum where you are most unlikely to find anyone that is expert in either HP or their default software is not going to be all that helpful to you.

As I do not own or have access to a HP product I have no idea what the antivirus product in question is. So I suggest you contact HP if you can not figure out what software has done this is called.

So, you are saying that it quarantined my entire Inbox? I assumed it quarantined only one message. You can still help me by telling me where my Inbox is stored. Thank you.

_____

Okay, I just called H-P. The fellow I got said that uninstalling the security program might release the Inbox, although I am concerned that TB has already created a new Inbox. They told me if I call back on Monday, people with more experience with this program can help me.

Please don't close this thread as there may be new developments. I still need to know exactly where my Inbox is stored -- what is the file called? Obviously, all my mailboxes are not stored in one file together because I can access my other mailboxes.

Thanks you.

You can still help me by telling me where my Inbox is stored. Thank you.

Hello

Thunderbird has so far always stored all mailboxes in the same directory. You can access any mailbox when running Thunderbird and do right clic / Properties and you will be able to see in the Properties dialog the 'location' field the place where your mail data is stored (never mind the 'mailbox//' prefix). You can then browse this directory to see what is in it. On the other hand, if your antivirus has moved the original mailbox elsewhere, only the antivirus software can say where and how to restore it.

That's useful information, but it isn't working for me. I have inserted the following in File Explorer, and it didn't open the directory for me:

C:/Users/caleb/AppData/Roaming/Thunderbird/Profiles/g6het2x9.default/Mail/Local Folders/Inbox

I also tried this:

C:/Users/caleb/AppData/Roaming/Thunderbird/Profiles/g6het2x9.default/Mail/Local Folders/

What am I doing wrong? Some of those directories are hidden, which makes it hard to work with them.

On Monday, I'll talk to someone at HP about their anti-virus program. They should be able to tell me how to un-quarantine my original Inbox. ____________

Ah, I did manage to get into the folder, but I'm not finding anything that looks like a quarantined file. HP should be able to help me.

Thank you.

Maybe you should add quotes " around the directory name, since it has a space in it: "C:/Users/caleb/AppData/Roaming/Thunderbird/Profiles/g6het2x9.default/Mail/Local Folders"

Thank you. As I said, I did manage to get into the directory, but I'm not seeing anything that looks like a quarantined Inbox file. I'm looking in the virus program now. __________

Well, I'm very proud of myself. I fixed the problem, and I won't have to call HP on Monday.

1. I went into Wolf Security (HP's antivirus program) and I found the list of quarantined files. I clicked a button to restore my old Inbox, but it didn't work because Thunderbird had already created a new Inbox.

2. So in File Explorer, I renamed the new Inbox file (after archiving the emails that I had received in it). I renamed it to "Inbox-New", but I could have chosen any name.

3. I then went into Wolf Security and restored my original Inbox again, and this time it worked.

4. In order to actually see my old Inbox, I had to reboot my computer. (Just restarting Thunderbird wasn't enough.)

I'm more resourceful than I realize. Thanks to the two of you for your help. You were especially helpful, gp. Matt had an attitude.

Matt had an attitude.

Instead of complaining about my attitude for having to deal with your "wolf Security" not Thunderbird issue, I suggest you start making plans for what you are going to do next time the same software quarantines the same file. Every time you get an email with malware would be my guess, so multiple times a year. If not the next time you do a scan because the original issue is still in the file you removed from quarantine so may well trigger a quarantine action again.