# Setting for scan email-in posts with Akismet
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393
**Category:** Feature
**Tags:** akismet
**Created:** [April 28, 2016, 7:57pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393 "2016-04-28T19:57:52Z")
**Posts on this page:** 12
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@downey](https://meta.discourse.org/u/downey)
#### Post date: [April 28, 2016, 7:57pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/1 "2016-04-28T19:57:52Z")
**Does the Akismet plugin scan posts that are processed via incoming “anonymous” email that stages an account for that user?** If not, can that happen somehow?
We’ve gotten a lot of typical looking spam (invoice due, etc.) in the past week. We have a private category that receives this feedback email so while it’s not a huge impact, people watching that category are getting Discourse-based spam email notifications. ☹
Seems like an obvious catch for Akismet, which tends to err on the side of false positives.
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### Author:  [@codinghorror](https://meta.discourse.org/u/codinghorror)
#### Post date: [April 28, 2016, 8:59pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/2 "2016-04-28T20:59:02Z")
Hmm is your mail provider not catching these? Email is viewed as something of a protected endpoint…
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### Author:  [@downey](https://meta.discourse.org/u/downey)
#### Post date: [April 28, 2016, 9:24pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/3 "2016-04-28T21:24:13Z")
Incoming through Google Apps, and no it’s not catching (enough of) them. Of course I also get similar messages in my own Gmail accounts several times per week.
Is there any value in skipping them?
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### Author:  [@codinghorror](https://meta.discourse.org/u/codinghorror)
#### Post date: [April 28, 2016, 9:42pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/4 "2016-04-28T21:42:53Z")
We had a LOT of false Akismet positives on PMs. A lot. That’s why we stopped doing it.
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### Author:  [@downey](https://meta.discourse.org/u/downey)
#### Post date: [April 28, 2016, 9:49pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/5 "2016-04-28T21:49:04Z")
Hmm. Don’t know what the code looks like, but any chance of exposing this as a site setting for the plugin? (Maybe something like “ **scan incoming emails** ” or maybe also “ **scan messages** ”?)
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### Author:  [@codinghorror](https://meta.discourse.org/u/codinghorror)
#### Post date: [April 28, 2016, 9:50pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/6 "2016-04-28T21:50:49Z")
Yeah as a site / plugin setting I can support it cc @eviltrout
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### Author:  [@DeanMarkTaylor](https://meta.discourse.org/u/DeanMarkTaylor)
#### Post date: [April 29, 2016, 1:36am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/7 "2016-04-29T01:36:12Z")
> [@codinghorror](#):
>
> We had a LOT of false Akismet positives on PMs. A lot. That’s why we stopped doing it.
If you haven’t already consider sending a custom `comment_type` to Akismet, perhaps “`email`”.
> **[Pro Tip: tell us your comment\_type](https://akismet.com/blog/pro-tip-tell-us-your-comment_type/)**
>
> This is the first in an irregular series of tips for developers interacting with the Akismet API. Akismet is very heavily dependent on the quality of the data included in API calls. Whether youR…
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### Author:  [@codinghorror](https://meta.discourse.org/u/codinghorror)
#### Post date: [April 29, 2016, 2:04am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/8 "2016-04-29T02:04:45Z")
Hmm good info, thanks! 🙇♂️
@eviltrout can we confirm we’re using `forum-post` as the `comment_type` for the existing stuff?
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### Author:  [@downey](https://meta.discourse.org/u/downey)
#### Post date: [April 29, 2016, 3:31am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/9 "2016-04-29T03:31:13Z")
This is a good idea, but I wonder if the content\_type should be `email` for all PM’s (web or email in), while email-to-post should still be `forum-post` (since that’s the type of content it would be).
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### Author:  [@DeanMarkTaylor](https://meta.discourse.org/u/DeanMarkTaylor)
#### Post date: [April 29, 2016, 3:39am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/10 "2016-04-29T03:39:04Z")
I guess it also depends on more factors:
- Is the target mail address a group
- or a reply targeting the traditional forum topics
- Is the content sent to Akismet the raw original email (with footers etc)
- or the processed post.
Can enough information be inferred to define a `comment_type` - perhaps.
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### Author:  [@zogstrip](https://meta.discourse.org/u/zogstrip)
#### Post date: [April 29, 2016, 9:16am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/11 "2016-04-29T09:16:08Z")
> [@codinghorror](#):
>
> can we confirm we’re using `forum-post` as the `comment_type` for the existing stuff?
We are indeed 😉
[https://github.com/discourse/discourse-akismet/blob/master/lib/discourse\_akismet.rb#L38](https://github.com/discourse/discourse-akismet/blob/master/lib/discourse_akismet.rb#L38)
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### Author:  [@schungx](https://meta.discourse.org/u/schungx)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2017, 7:45am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-for-scan-email-in-posts-with-akismet/43393/12 "2017-10-12T07:45:52Z")
So, back to the original question.
Are posts created via `email in` scanned via Akismet?