Is it the ISP or the Website Blocking Me? How to tell?

-1

I am trying to access one particular website for my work as a travel agent: outsideagents.com

The error is ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT on Google and Opera (without VPN), Website Not Responding in Safari. I was able to access it last Friday, then unable to Saturday morning.

I have done a hard reset on my router and have rebooted my mac many times. I've called Apple and we went through the entire clearing the cache and setting a new user on the computer to rule that out.

What I have noticed:

I am able to connect to the website by using my phone for cellular service or through other networks.
I can ping the website.
I am able to use a VPN (Opera) to get to the site using my home network.
I did a trace route, but don't really understand it--see below.

I've pretty much narrowed it down that it has to do with my IP address. I would like to know if it is my ISP (Comcast) or the Website (outsideagents.com, maybe a firewall) that is blocking me from getting to the website. How can you tell conclusively which it is? Are there any other tests I can run to tell where the hang up is exactly?

traceroute to outsideagents.com (104.154.105.132), 64 hops max, 72 byte packets
 1  192.168.0.1 (192.168.0.1)  2.336 ms  1.777 ms  1.535 ms
 2  96.120.4.1 (96.120.4.1)  10.322 ms  11.946 ms  10.460 ms
 3  96.108.191.173 (96.108.191.173)  11.609 ms  45.782 ms  58.412 ms
 4  ae-27-ar01.b0atlanta.ga.atlanta.comcast.net (162.151.88.205)  20.331 ms  11.774 ms  12.429 ms
 5  be-7725-cr02.56marietta.ga.ibone.comcast.net (68.86.93.125)  13.790 ms  13.177 ms  12.711 ms
 6  be-11440-pe01.56marietta.ga.ibone.comcast.net (68.86.85.246)  13.023 ms  11.597 ms  12.123 ms
 7  96-87-9-186-static.hfc.comcastbusiness.net (96.87.9.186)  10.576 ms  15.491 ms  10.724 ms
 8  * * *
 9  108.170.225.126 (108.170.225.126)  13.741 ms  16.299 ms  11.523 ms
10  108.170.249.162 (108.170.249.162)  10.889 ms  10.871 ms  10.643 ms
11  209.85.250.96 (209.85.250.96)  11.647 ms  11.356 ms  11.674 ms
12  209.85.142.161 (209.85.142.161)  30.552 ms  30.471 ms  29.274 ms
13  72.14.232.70 (72.14.232.70)  39.534 ms  39.513 ms  39.079 ms
14  72.14.236.127 (72.14.236.127)  39.973 ms  38.593 ms  37.697 ms
15  * * *
16  * * *
17  * * *
18  * * *
19  * * *
20  * * *
21  * * *
22  * * *
23  * * *
24  132.105.154.104.bc.googleusercontent.com (104.154.105.132)  49.100 ms  38.268 ms  39.109 ms

Here is the tcptraceroute. It ends with a destination not reached.

Selected device en0, address 192.168.0.2, port 50545 for outgoing packets
Tracing the path to outsideagents.com (104.154.105.132) on TCP port 80 (http), 30 hops max
 1  192.168.0.1  1.577 ms  1.387 ms  1.338 ms
 2  96.120.4.1  16.272 ms  9.520 ms  10.801 ms
 3  96.108.191.173  24.732 ms  12.530 ms  17.791 ms
 4  ae-27-ar01.b0atlanta.ga.atlanta.comcast.net (162.151.88.205)  11.958 ms  16.569 ms  10.160 ms
 5  be-7725-cr02.56marietta.ga.ibone.comcast.net (68.86.93.125)  13.447 ms  11.557 ms  14.654 ms
 6  be-11440-pe01.56marietta.ga.ibone.comcast.net (68.86.85.246)  12.766 ms  12.504 ms  10.659 ms
 7  173.167.59.74  11.230 ms  11.004 ms  11.034 ms
 8  209.85.252.161  10.429 ms  17.958 ms  12.257 ms
 9  108.170.249.162  11.459 ms  12.250 ms  11.166 ms
10  209.85.246.223  10.866 ms  11.927 ms  11.758 ms
11  209.85.142.161  30.138 ms  31.938 ms  28.936 ms
12  209.85.247.5  38.330 ms  51.766 ms  39.757 ms
13  216.239.57.235  46.243 ms  39.267 ms  37.724 ms
14  * * *
15  * * *
16  * * *
17  * * *
18  * * *
19  * * *
20  * * *
21  * * *
22  * * *
23  * * *
24  * * *
25  * * *
26  * * *
27  * * *
28  * * *
29  * * *
30  * * *
Destination not reached

KKing103

Posted 2018-05-23T20:14:55.610

Reputation: 11

Most importantly, what's the failure like? Does it show a certificate error? A network error? A blank page? An FBI warning? Without knowing the symptoms can't even guess at the cause. – user1686 – 2018-05-23T20:20:22.883

Please edit the question to limit it to a specific problem with enough detail to identify an adequate answer. Avoid asking multiple distinct questions at once. – Ramhound – 2018-05-23T20:26:22.003

I just need some help answering the question, is it the ISP or the Website. I'd like to know how to check are relating to the other questions. – KKing103 – 2018-05-23T20:33:54.627

2Do not use ping or traceroute for connectivity troubleshooting, as ICMP or UDP packets that they use respectively may have a completely different life on the network than TCP packets used by your browser. Use tcptraceroute at least. – Patrick Mevzek – 2018-05-23T20:35:41.067

Thanks, Patrick. I will try that next and post the results. – KKing103 – 2018-05-23T20:41:33.740

(1) Your question is a little confusing: “for my work”, “my router”, “my Mac”, “other networks”, and “my home network” (not to mention “my phone”); also “last Friday” and “Saturday morning”. Please make a list of which location / machine / browser / network configurations work reliably, intermittently, or never. Please do not respond in comments; [edit] your question to make it clearer and more complete. … (Cont’d) – G-Man Says 'Reinstate Monica' – 2018-05-26T20:01:24.760

(Cont’d) … (2) As your outputs show, the IP address of outsideagents.com is 104.154.105.132; and I can confirm that I see the same address from my system. Have you tried accessing the site by address instead of by name? Do you get different results? (3) I’m probably not going to be able to help you, but … it might be useful if you also ran traceroute and tcptraceroute from a place where it works (e.g., the “other networks” you mentioned) and post them for comparison. – G-Man Says 'Reinstate Monica' – 2018-05-26T20:01:26.533

Answers

See http://dnsviz.net/d/outsideagents.com/WwXRCQ/dnssec/ the domain name is not correctly configured DNS wise, hence connectivity can vary. This has nothing to do with the ISP per se, you have first to test the DNS and fix it if needed (or make the owner fix it if it is not your domain)

Errors (3)

    outsideagents.com zone: The server(s) were not responsive to queries over UDP. (198.181.255.100)
    outsideagents.com/A: The server was not reachable over UDP (EHOSTUNREACH). (198.181.255.100, UDP_0_EDNS0_32768_4096)
    outsideagents.com/NS: The server was not reachable over UDP (EHOSTUNREACH). (198.181.255.100, UDP_0_EDNS0_32768_4096)

So the nameserver at 198.181.255.100 (dns5.revelex.com.) needs to be fixed to reply correctly for this domain name or another nameserver must be used.

But it is probably not the root cause of your problem. Try any online testing tool from multiple locations. For example this one is able to connect to the website from almost everywhere (1 failed probe only). This strongly hints at a problem on your side.

Patrick Mevzek

Posted 2018-05-23T20:14:55.610

Reputation: 1 334

It is not my domain. I am just a lowly travel agent with enough tech background to keep looking and trying. I will send this to them. The other said the other "Destination Not Reached". If it is just the domain name, then why can I reach it by VPN? – KKing103 – 2018-05-23T21:11:35.303

One of the two nameservers is not configured properly, this can create variable situations where sometimes it works sometimes it does not. This is the first problem to address. There may be others after that, but it is pointless to search for them until the DNS configuration is not properly done. – Patrick Mevzek – 2018-05-23T21:13:51.033

VPN's use their own dns servers. – Moab – 2018-05-23T21:54:56.960

@Moab not strictly relevant. The recursive nameservers may change and be specific to the VPN, but the authoritative nameservers are those of the domain name, and the same whatever your connection is to the Internet. – Patrick Mevzek – 2018-05-23T22:13:14.097

@PatrickMevzek This page is the actual login page which blocks me also. tap.myagentgenie.com I ran this against the dnsviz with no errors. Any further suggestions on what steps to do next to determine if it is their firewall or my ISP? – KKing103 – 2018-05-25T12:51:10.213

Did you try to contact your ISP and/or technical people behind the website you try to reach? It is very difficult to come to clear conclusions but if I have to choose I would lean towards the idea that your ISP is doing something, based on the fact that it is the only connection not working. Note it may be as well the website that blocks different IPs or blocks of IP (for example because of prior abuse). – Patrick Mevzek – 2018-05-30T18:55:34.043

I find this website useful for just such situations:

Down for everyone or just me?

Bill Hileman

Posted 2018-05-23T20:14:55.610

Reputation: 757

Thanks, but doesn't apply.I know that the site is up and I can get to it from my devices outside of my network. – KKing103 – 2018-05-23T20:38:43.420