Extract attachments from emails that Gmail doesn't allow you to download. This is dumb. Please use Python >= 3.4.

extract-attachments.py

#!/usr/bin/env python3
# Get your files that Gmail block. Warning message:
# "Anti-virus warning - 1 attachment contains a virus or blocked file. Downloading this attachment is disabled."
# Based on: https://spapas.github.io/2014/10/23/retrieve-gmail-blocked-attachments/

# Instructions:
# Go to your emails, click the arrow button in the top right, "Show original", then "Download Original".
# Move the files to the same directory as this program, then run it.

import sys
import os
import email
import mailbox
from email import policy
from email.parser import BytesParser

# To automatically rename conflicing files, change this to True: (it adds a prefix to the filename, see get_new_filename below)
automatic_rename = False

def get_new_filename(old_fn):
    i = 1
    while True:
        new_fn = "%d-%s" % (i, old_fn)
        if not os.path.isfile(new_fn):
            return new_fn
        i += 1

if __name__ == '__main__':
    if sys.version_info[0] < 3:
        print("Please use Python 3.")
        sys.exit()

    if len(sys.argv) < 2:
        files = [f for f in os.listdir('.') if os.path.isfile(f) and f.endswith(('.txt', '.eml', '.mbox'))]
        if len(files) == 0:
            print("Please download the emails and put them in this directory with a .txt, .eml, or .mbox extension.")
            sys.exit()
        print("Here are the files in the current directory with .txt, .eml, or .mbox extension:")
        print('\n'.join(files))
        print()
        print("Press enter to extract attachments from these files.")
        input()
    else:
        files = sys.argv[1:]

    for f in files:
        print("Processing %s" % f)
        if f.endswith('.mbox'):
            messages = mailbox.mbox(f, factory=BytesParser(policy=policy.default).parse, create=False)
            print("%d messages." % len(messages))
            print()
            for msg in messages:
                print("Subject: %s" % msg['Subject'])
                for pl in msg.get_payload():
                    if isinstance(pl, str):
                        # not sure if there's a better way to skip this junk data
                        continue
                    fn = pl.get_filename()
                    if fn:
                        print("Found %s" % fn)
                        if os.path.isfile(fn):
                            print("The file '%s' already exists!" % fn)
                            if automatic_rename:
                                fn = get_new_filename(fn)
                                print("Changed the filename to: %s" % fn)
                            else:
                                print("Press enter to overwrite.")
                                input()
                        open(fn, 'wb').write(pl.get_payload(decode=True))
                print()
        else:
            msg = email.message_from_file(open(f), policy=policy.default)
            print("Subject: %s" % msg['Subject'])
            for pl in msg.get_payload():
                fn = pl.get_filename()
                if fn:
                    print("Found %s" % fn)
                    if os.path.isfile(fn):
                        print("The file '%s' already exists!" % fn)
                        if automatic_rename:
                            fn = get_new_filename(fn)
                            print("Changed the filename to: %s" % fn)
                        else:
                            print("Press enter to overwrite.")
                            input()
                    open(fn, 'wb').write(pl.get_payload(decode=True))
            print()

gmail-virus-warning.png

Made some updates:

• Gmail now downloads these files as .eml and not .txt, so the script now discovers these files as well.
• Simpler parsing by using policy.default. Unicode in subject lines should decode properly now.
• Support for .mbox format. This is the format that Google Takeout gives you the emails in. (I used https://gist.github.com/benwattsjones/060ad83efd2b3afc8b229d41f9b246c4 as a reference.)
• Automatic renaming of conflicting files (you have to opt in by setting automatic_rename = True).

Enjoy!

Anyone still using this? :)