Email Notification for Private Messages Wrinkle

I am finding that people who receive notifications about a private message are replying to that email instead of logging in to reply to the PM.   I am trying to figure out how to address this and have come up with possible solutions.  If you can let me know these are possible and/or if you have other suggestions:

1. FOOTER NOTE
I know there is a message in the footer already that says:  "NOTE: This email was automatically generated from..."

I was thinking of adding wording like: Please log in to reply to this message. or  Do not reply to this message.

If this is a viable solution, what language key targets this so I can customize using translation overrides (assuming this message is specific to PM messenger vs a global message that goes out for all notifications)

2. DO NOT DISPLAY MESSAGE CONTENT IN THE EMAIL
Is there a way to hide the contents of the message so that the email only shows:

xxx has sent you a new private message. (which links to the PM)

This forces them to log in to view the message.

3. REPLY TO EMAIL = SENDER
Is there a way to configure the reply email to be the person that sent the message so that if the recipient does ignore the "do not reply" note and replies, it goes to the sender rather than the website email?

Thanks!






 

Use a noreply@domain email address and bounce any emails sent to it. Next improve the footer using language overrides however you see fit. Beyond that there's nothing you can really do.

2. DO NOT DISPLAY MESSAGE CONTENT IN THE EMAIL

That's already the default behavior. My guess is you turned on the "Include Message" parameter in Private Message System > Parameters > Internal > Notification. Turn it back off and the message won't be included anymore.

3. REPLY TO EMAIL = SENDER

No. This exposes your users email addresses against their will. I do not suggest ever enabling such features should they exist elsewhere (they do for the email form built into CB, but again I do not recommend using that).

Thanks, Kyle.

Next improve the footer using language overrides however you see fit. 

Do you recall what the language key is for this notification email?
 

No. This exposes your users email addresses against their will. I do not suggest ever enabling such features should they exist elsewhere (they do for the email form built into CB, but again I do not recommend using that).

Refresh my memory on where the email form is built into CB is - I'd like to take a look at it.

Do you recall what the language key is for this notification email?

For the footer? It doesn't have one specific to it. The generic footer is the following.

EMAIL_NOTE_AUTOMATIC_GENERATION

Refresh my memory on where the email form is built into CB is - I'd like to take a look at it.

It's based off whatever you have "Email Handling" in CB > Configuration > General set to. If the email form is enabled it adds a link on the profile menu to email them as well as their email address output on profile can link to the form. I don't really recommend using it though as it's basically just a spam vector on public sites. It's useful for intranets though (internal CB sites), which is primarily its purpose for existing.

Thank you.  So, to be sure, the contents of  EMAIL_NOTE_AUTOMATIC_GENERATION would appear on all email notifications the website sends out (eg., someone joining a group, etc)

It's based off whatever you have "Email Handling" in CB > Configuration > General set to. If the email form is enabled it adds a link on the profile menu to email them as well as their email address output on profile can link to the form. I don't really recommend using it though as it's basically just a spam vector on public sites. It's useful for intranets though (internal CB sites), which is primarily its purpose for existing.

Thanks for this - yes, I will definitely consider the concern about exposing emails.  The site operates much like an internal one, as access is restricted, but the concern with spamming is noted.  I have two user groups, one of which is free but has limited access (such as no access to PM or groups) while the paid one does have those.  It doesn't look like the above setting allows for a distinction for specific member types or usergroups (i.e. global settting) 

So, to be sure, the contents of EMAIL_NOTE_AUTOMATIC_GENERATION would appear on all email notifications the website sends out (eg., someone joining a group, etc)

Yes, it will be included in all automated emails that are intended to be no-reply.

It doesn't look like the above setting allows for a distinction for specific member types or usergroups (i.e. global settting)

It does check access to the Email field so you could try using CB Conditional or CB Privacy to further restrict access to the email form.