email-connect/docs/email-evidence-canon.md

Email Evidence Canon

Rule

Email events are evidence, not result satisfaction.

The scanner reports email-channel facts and uncertainty. A downstream coordination runtime decides whether those facts satisfy a coordination case.

Initial Message Classes

• hard_bounce
• soft_bounce
• delayed_delivery_notice
• final_delivery_failure
• out_of_office
• human_reply
• complaint_or_abuse
• unsubscribe_or_opt_out
• challenge_response
• unknown_return_message
• unrelated_message
• parse_failed

Initial Normalized Events

Message class	Normalized event	Assessment
hard_bounce	notification.endpoint.rejected_permanent	fail.hard_bounce
soft_bounce	notification.endpoint.rejected_temporary	undef.deferred
delayed_delivery_notice	notification.endpoint.deferred	undef.deferred
final_delivery_failure	notification.endpoint.rejected_permanent	fail.expired_without_delivery
out_of_office	interaction.out_of_office_received	undef.out_of_office
human_reply	interaction.reply_received	success.reply_received
complaint_or_abuse	notification.channel.complaint_received	fail.complaint_received
unsubscribe_or_opt_out	notification.channel.unsubscribe_received	fail.unsubscribed
unknown_return_message	notification.endpoint.unknown	undef.conflicting_evidence
challenge_response	interaction.unverified_actor_interaction	undef.identity_uncertain
parse_failed	diagnostic.message.parse_failed	undef.parse_failed
expected recipient with no evidence	diagnostic.expected_recipient.no_evidence	undef.no_signal

Overclaim Prevention

• No bounce found does not mean delivery success.
• Provider acceptance does not mean endpoint acceptance.
• Endpoint acceptance does not mean inbox placement.
• Out-of-office does not prove recipient awareness or action.
• Human reply does not prove legal acceptance.
• Unknown return messages remain visible.
• Parse failures are diagnostic rows, not delivery or interaction outcomes.
• Expected-recipient no-evidence rows mean no mailbox evidence was found in the inspected range, not that notification succeeded or failed.
• Scanner and proxy interactions must stay below identity-bound interaction.

Endpoint Quality Hints

Endpoint quality rows are diagnostic state, not verdicts:

Evidence	Quality hint
Hard bounce or final failure	reachability = unreachable, last_failure_at
Soft bounce or delayed delivery	reachability = degraded, last_failure_at
Complaint	suppression_state = suppressed
Unsubscribe	suppression_state = opted_out
Human reply	last_success_at
Out-of-office	reachability = uncertain, last_auto_reply_at

These hints can guide future suppression and review workflows, but they do not prove human awareness, authority, payload access, or coordination success.