Cannot Access Sites: 00002eff

Cannot access the main entry page of AHK or Rosetta Code, or their forums using Microsoft Edge 38.14393.0.0 or Internet Explorer 11.187.14393.0. Update logs show these have not been updated just prior to the issue The DOM Explorer log shows this:

SCRIPT7002: XMLHttpRequest: Network Error 0x2eff, 
Could not complete the operation due to error 00002eff.

IE11 produces this output (all TLS turned on):

This page can't be displayed Turn on TLS 1.0, TLS 1.1, and TLS 1.2 in Advanced settings and try connecting to https://autohotkey.com again. If this error persists, it is possible that this site uses an unsupported protocol or cipher suite such as RC4 (link for the details), which is not considered secure. Please contact your site administrator.

The afore-mentioned RC4 link is here. Lothe to want to do that, but a Fixit script or some method with compatibility settings that apply only while the page is loading might work. Or is there some other resource?

Laurie Stearn

Posted 2016-09-26T12:47:27.643

Reputation: 344

Both websites work for me using the current vesion of IE and Edge, Windows 10 Version 1607, which tells me the problem is likely because the use of a proxy server or security software scanning https traffic. Can you confirm your using neither? – Ramhound – 2016-09-26T16:50:38.730

Only Smartscreen and Defender -Will try the offline scan. Running under a managed domain here. No suspicious looking active processes. Could it.be a corrupt certificate this end?

– Laurie Stearn – 2016-09-26T23:02:30.703

Come to think of it I was still logged in to AHK when the issue occurred. Don't know if a login was created with Rosetta though. Still a problem there as well. Edit: Was able to access an archived page at AHK running Fiddler, but to decrypt https it requires this certificate installed. The main page produces a proxy warning with Fiddler running.

– Laurie Stearn – 2016-09-27T06:16:11.747

Certificates are unlikely to become corrupt. If you suspect they are then verify the certificate, that IE recieves, is the same certificate that Chrome and Firefox recieve. – Ramhound – 2016-09-27T14:29:38.033

It's very odd. Turn off Smartscreen and there is no 2eff or 2efd (yes this even popped up on an unsuccessful load of this page). Load up a page at AHK, there is an HTML1300... then nothing. Cleared all the cache, cookies, nothing in the event logs. Can it be a H/W issue when loading certain sites might "trip" some threshold or such? – Laurie Stearn – 2016-09-28T12:52:39.067

@Ramhound: Are you running non-MS browsers on the same machine? If so, has one of them flipped the fifth bit of SecureProtocols for you already- or do they ignore that registry key in any case? – Laurie Stearn – 2016-09-28T14:38:09.730

I do have Firefox and Chrome but neither are set to be the default and I manually run them. They are also portable versions of the browser. I otherwise always use Edge. – Ramhound – 2016-09-28T23:19:34.130

Does the site work with any other browser? – Joe DF – 2017-01-15T20:42:49.270

@Joe DF: No, see comment below answer. No difference either with "C:\Program Files (x86)\Google\Chrome\Application\chrome.exe" –ssl-version-min=tls1.1 – Laurie Stearn – 2017-01-16T03:49:55.270

Happened again with ERR_CONNECTION_RESET in Chrome after WU rebooting. Although the same version of Edge does not log any errors, it's the same "Hmmm..." screen as before. Think it is related to SSL.

– Laurie Stearn – 2017-01-13T14:12:04.927

Reset the router for a new IP and the error is gone. It looks very much like malware is taking over the IP addresses of this world. So much for the free internet :( – Laurie Stearn – 2017-01-21T13:47:48.053

Cannot Access Sites: 00002eff

Answers