Google suddenly cannot open
Firefox (fully update) has suddenly started refusing to open Google, Google Calendar, or Google Mail. I have uninstalled Sophos Home antivirus which "might" have been scanning secure sites, with no effect. I am at home, so there is no "enterprise" scanner. I have deleted the cert8.db file to force new certificates, again with no effect. Other secure sites work fine. I captured and de-coded the certificate which Firefox is "not recognizing", and it is Google G2 - with no errors. Chrome, etc. are all opening Google just fine.
I certainly appreciate any help possible. David
Chosen solution
There is some issue with Google OCSP server responses the past couple of days. You could try this:
(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button promising to be careful or accepting the risk.
(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste ocsp and pause while the list is filtered
(3) If the security.OCSP.require preference is bolded and "modified" or "user set" to true, double-click it to restore the default value of false
You may need to reload your Google page bypassing the cache, using either:
- Shift+click the reload button
- Ctrl+Shift+r (on Mac Command+Shift+r)
To clarify, this does not completely disable checking whether a certificate is revoked. There are two different preferences:
- security.OCSP.enabled = 1 (default setting) requires Firefox to check the cert with the OCSP server to make sure it hasn't been revoked
- security.ocsp.require determines what happens if the OCSP server does not respond
- false (default setting) treats the cert as not revoked and you can connect normally
- true treats the cert as revoked and prevents you from connecting
I suppose your choice about "require" depends on how often you expect to encounter a server with a revoked certificate and a nonresponsive OCSP server. I think the risk is low, but then, I may not be as adventurous in my browsing as you are.
Read this answer in context 👍 6All Replies (11)
Chosen Solution
There is some issue with Google OCSP server responses the past couple of days. You could try this:
(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button promising to be careful or accepting the risk.
(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste ocsp and pause while the list is filtered
(3) If the security.OCSP.require preference is bolded and "modified" or "user set" to true, double-click it to restore the default value of false
You may need to reload your Google page bypassing the cache, using either:
- Shift+click the reload button
- Ctrl+Shift+r (on Mac Command+Shift+r)
To clarify, this does not completely disable checking whether a certificate is revoked. There are two different preferences:
- security.OCSP.enabled = 1 (default setting) requires Firefox to check the cert with the OCSP server to make sure it hasn't been revoked
- security.ocsp.require determines what happens if the OCSP server does not respond
- false (default setting) treats the cert as not revoked and you can connect normally
- true treats the cert as revoked and prevents you from connecting
I suppose your choice about "require" depends on how often you expect to encounter a server with a revoked certificate and a nonresponsive OCSP server. I think the risk is low, but then, I may not be as adventurous in my browsing as you are.
I have the same issue but I already have security.OCSP.require set to false.
Hi pointlessone, if the above does not work for you, then you do not have the same problem. Same symptoms maybe, but different underlying disease. Let's start with the message you're getting. Could you copy/paste the error page and click the Advanced button and copy/paste the more detailed information there? In particular, there's a code in ALL CAPS that helps us with diagnosis.
Articles that may be useful for reference:
The message is the following:
Unable to connect Firefox can’t establish a connection to the server at groups.google.com.
There are also a few suggestion as for the reason and possible solution. There's no error code like in case of invalid certificate, for instance. There's only one button: Try Again.
Hi pointlessone, I don't know why you would get that message as long as the server is responding normally.
Does it make any difference if you use an HTTPS link:
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!overview
(That's where my Firefox gets redirected if I try your link.)
It happens on HTTPS link. In fact, when I explicitly enter HTTP URL Network tab in Developer Tools only logs one request with HTTPS. The request is not finished. It has a lock with a red line over it next to the domain. Tooltip says "The connection used to fetch this resource was not secure."
Hi pointlessone, is this issue limited to the groups subdomain? Main search page (https://www.google.com/), Gmail, etc., are okay?
Do you use any site blocking add-ons or intermediary software that could affect Firefox's ability to connect to the site?
It happens for all subdomains of google.com I tried.
It's the same for www.google.com.
For search.google.com it's a bit different: Secure Connection Failed. But it looks the same in DevTools. It also doesn't provide an error code.
Update: the issue affects Nightly but not stable.
I tried a new profile. Stable (58.0.2) is able to load google.com, groups.google.com, news.google.com.
Nightly can not load any of those on a new profile.
I am also experiencing this issue - I cannot access google.com, gmail.com, drive.google.com, or any other google service website. In addition, google-provided CDN/service requests fail on other sites which use them (google fonts, etc). However, I can access google in a private tab. Weird, right?
I can also ping google from the command line, and it works fine in chrome.
I'm running 59.0.2 on OSX 10.11.6 .
Modified
I am having a similar issue. Quantum 60.1,, 64bit version, on Win7, 64. I am in Germany. Periodically, i cannot access Google.com, or search in the FF search field, which is set to search on Google. If i go directly to a website, its fine. Also, if i search for google.de, its fine. No problem using another browser. I would love to get to the bottom of this. thanks