Wireless login to email stopped working!!!!

[RobTheUser]

Hi guys,
I am not an "IT guy" so sorry if this is a very naive question. I am a business owner and we have two business email addresses that we started using via webmail.

Facts:

• We were setup for email access through webmail ~1.5 weeks ago.
• We routinely access our webmail through wireless network (at home)
• I have Airport Extreme router at home (1st Gen)
• Everything was working beautifully until Thurs afternoon (~4PM PST)

Problem:

• Login via webmail gives "the login is invalid"
• Client email that I use (Outlook 2011 for Mac) also stopped working, saying "authentication failed"
• Our email user/pass are correct

What I did:

1. I tested this with direct connection to internet and wireless.
2. Direct connection worked beautifully
3. Wireless (at home) doesn't work
4. Wireless at 2 other locations (parents, sister) worked also
5. I reset the router to fresh settings (just in case there is a hick up there)

I believe our Airport router is the culprit and causing some communication breakdown with the server. The server admin was away this weekend but says he doesn't know about Apple routers to be of help. I am stuck between a rock and a hard place. We use wireless at home and switching back and forth to hard wired connection is not a viable option everytime we want to check for email

Any suggestions would be quite welcome. I am almost at my wits end with this.

Cheers,
Robert

 

[Serra]

I think maybe everyone ignored this thread because you said, "I'm not an IT guy", which is short for you likely don't know what you are doing, so you might have missed something.

Good news. I'm having the same issue. I'm a server guy and I have an IT guy that I work closely with.

Here is the scenario:

1. User can not login to webmail. They they the "Invalid Login" message when they try.
2. User can not SMTP_AUTH in Outlook.

However, my IT guy and I can both login from our locations with the same login and password. When we remote into the client's computer, we can't login. The client's cell phone can't login if it is on the wireless network, but if he goes to the mobile network, no problem with SMTP_AUTH.

Now, here is where it gets interesting.

1. It is not a firewall or cPhulk issue since the client can get to the server. Even if we disable both, the client can login to webmail, but gets 'invalid login'.
2. It is machine specific!!!

We moved the client to a different server and it resolved the issue.

So, basically, the client can't use webmail, cPanel nor can they SMTP_AUTH on one specific server, but can from another server with no changes on the client side! They can see their website just fine on both servers.

I checked IPTABLES and their IP wasn't listed. Obviously it isn't anything on the client side, since a server move fixed the issue. Also there were no log entries at all for the client in the cpanel or message log.

So, this is a real issue and we gave up trying to solve it and took the easy route. Others might not have the ability to do that.

 

[cPanelMichael]

Hello

Could you verify if you are using Courier or Dovecot? It's possible the failure is due to a configuration value limit configured in:

"WHM Home » Service Configuration » Mailserver Configuration"

Are there any entries in /var/log/maillog when the login failure occurs? Is "Allow Plaintext Authentication" enabled?

Thank you.

 

[Serra]

Dovecot is the mail program.

There were log enteries:
Jun 5 08:28:32 mag dovecot: imap-login: Aborted login (auth failed, 1 attempts): user=<[email protected]>, method=PLAIN, rip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, lip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

There were those log entries, but not from 127.0.0.1, so I don't think that was webmail. I suspect it was his ipad or Outlook. There were no 127.0.0.1 entries for that user or domain.

Plain text is set to Yes.

 

[cPanelMichael]

Does the client use any specific firewall or antivirus applications on their local machine that could have prevented the connection attempt to the original server's IP address? If so, did they try disabling those applications to see if the issue continued?

Thank you.

 

[Serra]

Does the client use any specific firewall or antivirus applications on their local machine that could have prevented the connection attempt to the original server's IP address? If so, did they try disabling those applications to see if the issue continued?.

No we setup a test account on another server and the client was able to login to cpanel and webmail on the other server without any issues or without disabling any software. The client was also able to use cpanel, webmail and SMTP_AUTH when we moved their account to a different server.

Also, the PC tech was unable to login to his own email account, which was on the same server. He was unable to log into his own account after we moved the client account to the new machine, while the client was able to login on the new server. So, we know it is specific to the server, not the user or account.

It appears that it was server specific for that user. That is counter what I'd expect too, since it wasn't a PC issue and it wasn't a server blocking mechanism like a firewall or cPhulk. The client simply couldn't login to his account and got the error message.

Here is the weird part. We identified another client with the same issue later that day. We moved the second client to a new server and they also were able to login to their account with no changes.

 

[cPanelMichael]

There is a small possibility that their local router/antivirus/firewall application blocked a login attempt based on a specific IP address, so moving servers could have resolved that.

Please open a support ticket if you continue to experience this issue:

Submit A Ticket

You can post the ticket number here so we can keep this thread updated.

Thank you.

 

[Serra]

There is a small possibility that their local router/antivirus/firewall application blocked a login attempt based on a specific IP address, so moving servers could have resolved that.

I don't know of any PC application that would block a specific port or port range for a PC on automatically. Keep in mind that the customer was able to see their website, go to the login screen and login, but was given a "Login Invalid" message when they attempted to login. The person doing the login in was a PC tech, not a user. The PC tech that maintains the users system, installed the router, installed the antivirus software, and I doubt they had a firewall beyond the standard windows firewall.

The IP was not blocked in any way. The login failure was did not result in a IP block, as the user was able to test it several times. Each time getting a message "Login Invalid".

I can imagine that a user might do something wrong, but the PC tech who was doing the testing has been working with me and my servers and systems for 10 years. The same username and password worked on his office PC at the same time it was not working on the client PC.

While it is POSSIBLE that there was an issue on the client end, I think that between the two of us, we would have found it. The PC tech on the PC side and me on the server side disabled all of the firewalls and virus scanners to verify that it wasn't an blocking issue. Even if it was a blocking issue related to the customer's PC, then tell me any program that would block a user going into webmail, but allow them to get to the server that didn't block webmail on a different server. It would need to be port and IP specific and can tell you that I can't think of any automatic system at the consumer level that has that ability.

 

[cPanelMichael]

Yes, it's also possible there is an issue with Dovecot causing this problem, which is why it's a good idea to open a support ticket if the issue continues. This will allow us to login to the server and investigate further.

Thank you.