Is there a bug in the Messages?

I had that too yesterday – but I wondered if it perhaps related to that spam message that others received?...

OIC – you mean that when a spammer is removed, it still appears as a new message though it is gone?

That is my guess, but not substantiated!

Yes, that’s correct. When someone is banned, their PMs disappear. If you had one in your messages that you had not read yet, the notification of the new message remains, but the message itself is gone.

Yay!

Yep, spam leaves before you read it. If you get the email alert, you can read the spam PM there (or at least, I could).

I recently had a message I had already read come up as a new one. But I suspected that was due to a message I received from “a lovely 23 year old Asian girl who read my profile and wants to get to know” me better lol.