Closed Bug 1843833 Opened 2 months ago Closed 12 days ago

Subject of encrypted messages in the message list always shown as "..."

Categories

(MailNews Core :: Security: OpenPGP, defect)

Product:
MailNews Core
Component:
Security: OpenPGP
Version:
Thunderbird 115
Type:
defect

Tracking

(Not tracked)

Status:
RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 1831764

People

(Reporter: info, Unassigned)

Details

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:109.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/115.0

Steps to reproduce:

  • I have received several PGP-encrypted messages that had the subject encrypted.
  • In TB 102, I have opened those messages (by double-clicking them one by one in the message list).
  • In TB 102, I have closed those messages after having read them.
  • In TB 102, after having opened and closed those messages, the subject of each messages appeared in clear-text (i.e., in decrypted form) in the message list as desired and expected.
  • Then I upgraded to TB 115.

Actual results:

  • In 115, in the message list, the subject of each of those messages appears as "..." after the upgrade.
  • In 115, it is not possible to restore the subject of those messages by opening and closing them (as it used to work in 102, see above).
  • Other ideas to restore those subjects (e.g., "Repair folder") did not work as well.
  • Except using the ugly "trick" shown below, it is not possible to restore the subjects of those message in a reasonable way.

Expected results:

  • TB 115 should have preserved those messages' subjects during the upgrade so that those subjects still appear in clear-text (i.e., in decrypted form) in the message list, as it was the case before the upgrade.
  • Alternatively (and worse), TB 115 should at least restore those subjects when the respective messages are opened and closed (as it was the case in 102).

Further information:

This is a show stopper, and we can't use version 115 until this is fixed. We have a lot of encrypted messages that we have received before TB 115 came out, and we definitely need to see their subject in clear-text as it was possible in TB 102.

To help you analyze the situation and work out a fix:

  1. This happens with messages that have been received before the upgrade from 102 to 115. In TB 115, if a new message comes in and we open this new message and close it again, its subject appears as clear-text in the message list afterwards.

  2. There seems to be an ugly trick to make TB 115 show those subjects again even for messages that have been received before the upgrade: If we move one of those messages to another folder, then move it back to its original location, and then open and close it again, TB 115 shows its subject as clear-text afterwards. It seems that moving a message to another folder makes 115 think that this message is "new" and makes 115 show its subject correctly after having opened it.

However, this is only a hint to the developers to help them analyze the issue. It is not a viable workaround, because the encrypted messages we have received before the upgrade to 115 are scattered over several thousands of folders that are deeply nested. It is impossible for us find all of those messages, and it is impossible to apply the trick mentioned above to each of them or to open each of them just to have their subjects restored.

Due to limited time, we didn't investigate yet how the destruction of the subject impacts the search results, but I can imagine the there is a negative effect. Unfortunately, I'll have to leave this investigation to others for the moment.

Best regards, and thanks in advance,

Binarus

Component: Untriaged → Security: OpenPGP
Product: Thunderbird → MailNews Core

Looks like a duplicate of bug 1831764.

(In reply to Binarus from comment #0)

I just ran mozregression --app thunderbird --good 102 --bad 118 --profile-persistence clone-first. In 102 I added my IMAP account, imported my personal key and can confirm this:

  • In TB 102, after having opened and closed those messages, the subject of each messages appeared in clear-text (i.e., in decrypted form) in the message list as desired and expected.
  • Then I upgraded to TB 115.

But the following I can't confirm in the used 118 build:

  • In 115, in the message list, the subject of each of those messages appears as "..." after the upgrade.
  • In 115, it is not possible to restore the subject of those messages by opening and closing them (as it used to work in 102, see above).

All previously opened messages are shown with unencrypted subjects from the beginning.

Binarus, is this still happening for you with the latest beta or release version?

Flags: needinfo?(info)

Thank you very much for caring; please excuse the delay.

To be honest, I can't test it any more because a while ago a helpful person has already provided us a patched version that has solved the problem. We're using that patched version since, so I wouldn't see a difference when trying 118. Due to special circumstances, I currently don't have the resources to downgrade or to conduct systematic tests.

However, the same person really knows what he's talking about and has told me that we should close this bug because it is a duplicate of #1831764, and because the patch there will solve the problem.

That's what I'll try in a few minutes.

Thank you very much for your help and for working out a patch (in the other bug report)!

Best regards,

Binarus

Flags: needinfo?(info)
Status: UNCONFIRMED → RESOLVED
Closed: 12 days ago
Duplicate of bug: 1831764
Resolution: --- → DUPLICATE
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