TAB symbols may be converted incorrectly to spaces in Exchange Server 2007

Consider the following scenario:

• You receive a MIME message whose body is in the plain text format from the Internet. Or, a MIME message whose body is in the plain text format is created by an internal user in an Exchange Server 2007 environment.
• This message contains some TAB symbols.

In this scenario, the TAB symbols are converted incorrectly to spaces when the MIME message is submitted to the mailbox stores. Because of this incorrect conversion, the recipients may encounter some unexpected issues. For example, a user may experience an issue in a scenario where an application that generates reports in plain text format uses TAB symbols to format data into a tabular structure. In such a scenario, when the recipients receive such a message, the recipients may see that the data in the message is incoherent.
Notes

• When recipients use MAPI clients or POP3/IMAP4 clients to access the MIME message, the recipients may still encounter this issue. This is because the MIME message is converted by the transport component when the message is delivered.
• If the message was created by an internal MAPI client, internal recipients that use MAPI clients do not encounter the problem. This is because the message is not a MIME message. However, internal recipients that use POP3/IMAP4 clients may still encounter the problem. This is because a message always is converted to a MIME type when the message is retrieved from the mailbox store.

To resolve this problem, download Update Rollup 4 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1. Then, install the update on the Exchange server. For more information about Update Rollup 4 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1, see the following Exchange Help topic: For more information about how to obtain the latest Exchange service pack or update rollup, see the following Exchange Help topic:

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the "Applies to" section.