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Multiple Secure connection failed after windows update

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  • 1 has this problem
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  • Last reply by Hiigara129

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A couple of days ago my computer (an HP laptop) ran a windows 10 update. Afterwards I have multiple sites telling me Secure Connection Failed, including Gmail and many news sites. I also have some sites not loading correctly (not sure how to describe it so I included a full screen shot of the page in uploaded images). Now the thing is I don't have the problems with Microsoft edge, on my phone or on my old computer's Firefox that hasn't had the Windows update, so I know the problem is related to that. I've already tried clearing the cache, refreshing Firefox and even uninstalled/reinstalled it. None of them worked.Hopefully someone can help me find a workaround or the next Firefox update will address/fix these issues.

A couple of days ago my computer (an HP laptop) ran a windows 10 update. Afterwards I have multiple sites telling me Secure Connection Failed, including Gmail and many news sites. I also have some sites not loading correctly (not sure how to describe it so I included a full screen shot of the page in uploaded images). Now the thing is I don't have the problems with Microsoft edge, on my phone or on my old computer's Firefox that hasn't had the Windows update, so I know the problem is related to that. I've already tried clearing the cache, refreshing Firefox and even uninstalled/reinstalled it. None of them worked.Hopefully someone can help me find a workaround or the next Firefox update will address/fix these issues.

Chosen solution

OK I just switched back to my original profile and shockingly its working! I have no idea how that did anything but I can get back on ALL the messed up sites. Thanks for all your help.

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All Replies (16)

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Hi Hiigara129, sorry to hear about this problem. Have you already shut down and restarted Windows since this problem began, to complete any queued updates?

Could you provide more details about the error page? Firefox has a couple different security error pages, and there are corresponding help articles for each one:

Hopefully one of those will get you either the solution, or enough background to give us more details on the problem. Thanks.

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jscher2000 said

Hi Hiigara129, sorry to hear about this problem. Have you already shut down and restarted Windows since this problem began, to complete any queued updates? Could you provide more details about the error page? Firefox has a couple different security error pages, and there are corresponding help articles for each one: Hopefully one of those will get you either the solution, or enough background to give us more details on the problem. Thanks.

I have restarted my laptop sense then and windows did another update but it made no difference. For some reason Firefox won't let me take a screenshot of it so this is what the error says:

Secure Connection Failed

The connection to the server was reset while the page was loading.

   The page you are trying to view cannot be shown because the authenticity of the received data could not be verified.
   Please contact the website owners to inform them of this problem.

I read the Troubleshoot Secure Connection failure but that only seems to have solutions for various security product users. The only thing I use is Kaspersky and its never caused any issue like this. I actually found a thread on Microsoft that described the exact same issues I'm having but it's from three years ago and Microsoft apparently said that the issue would be on Firefox's end. Here's the link: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-networking-winpc/secure-connection-failed-errors-in-firefox-after/50096c38-75dc-45a2-95c6-cb68a14e72b0

So clearly this has happened before and somehow it was fixed before.

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Windows 10 has changed a lot in the past year, so a thread from three years ago, probably isn't super relevant.

Is there a pattern to the sites that do not work?

Does it make any difference if you remove Kaspersky from the loop (steps in one of the other articles)?

Could you test in Firefox's Safe Mode? In its Safe Mode, Firefox temporarily deactivates extensions, hardware acceleration, and some other advanced features to help you assess whether these are causing the problem.

If Firefox is not running: Hold down the Shift key when starting Firefox. (On Mac, hold down the option/alt key instead of the Shift key.)

If Firefox is running: You can restart Firefox in Safe Mode using either:

  • "3-bar" menu button > "?" Help button > Restart with Add-ons Disabled
  • (menu bar) Help menu > Restart with Add-ons Disabled

and OK the restart.

Both scenarios: A small dialog should appear. Click "Start in Safe Mode" (not Refresh).

Any improvement?

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jscher2000 said

Windows 10 has changed a lot in the past year, so a thread from three years ago, probably isn't super relevant. Is there a pattern to the sites that do not work? Does it make any difference if you remove Kaspersky from the loop (steps in one of the other articles)? Could you test in Firefox's Safe Mode? In its Safe Mode, Firefox temporarily deactivates extensions, hardware acceleration, and some other advanced features to help you assess whether these are causing the problem. I don't know how to do that as If Firefox is not running: Hold down the Shift key when starting Firefox. (On Mac, hold down the option/alt key instead of the Shift key.) If Firefox is running: You can restart Firefox in Safe Mode using either:
  • "3-bar" menu button > "?" Help button > Restart with Add-ons Disabled
  • (menu bar) Help menu > Restart with Add-ons Disabled
and OK the restart. Both scenarios: A small dialog should appear. Click "Start in Safe Mode" (not Refresh). Any improvement?

I'm simply saying those are the same issues I'm having and found it when I was looking for solutions.

Yes there is. Gmail (but strangely not other google sites), almost every news site (again strangely not BBC) , many video game sites (they either don't load or load like the image I attached earlier) and several manga sites.

Not sure how to do that with Kaspersky. I was going to try to disable HTTPS Scanning but the institutions don't match up to how Firefox looks now.

Just tried safe mode, no difference.

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Could this be a Microsoft Family Safety (parental controls) issue?

Could you re-post the screenshots? They seem to have gotten lost.

If sites look like they don't have any styling, that can indicate that Firefox can load files from the site's main server, but not other servers used by the site. To see whether there is a pattern of particular servers, you could open the Network Monitor in the lower part of the tab. Either:

  • "3-bar" menu button > Web Developer > Network
  • (menu bar) Tools > Web Developer > Network
  • (Windows) Ctrl+Shift+e

When you reload the page, Firefox should start listing all the files it is requesting, along with information about whether the request was successful (e.g., 200 or 304 code) or unsuccessful.

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jscher2000 said

Could this be a Microsoft Family Safety (parental controls) issue? Could you re-post the screenshots? They seem to have gotten lost. If sites look like they don't have any styling, that can indicate that Firefox can load files from the site's main server, but not other servers used by the site. To see whether there is a pattern of particular servers, you could open the Network Monitor in the lower part of the tab. Either:
  • "3-bar" menu button > Web Developer > Network
  • (menu bar) Tools > Web Developer > Network
  • (Windows) Ctrl+Shift+e
When you reload the page, Firefox should start listing all the files it is requesting, along with information about whether the request was successful (e.g., 200 or 304 code) or unsuccessful.

Maybe? Though I can't imagine why my email would be under parental lockdown. How would I test if that's the issue?

Sure.

OK I have opened the Network monitor but I'm not sure what I'm looking for. I see several different tabs (Inspector, Console, debugger ex ex) but nothing called files. When I'm under the network tab I see status, method, file, domain, cause ex ex. It also says the connection used to fetch this resource was not secure. Is there any way to bypass secure connection or toggle Firefox to allow the connection even if it doesn't think its secure?

Also, could this be related in any way to proxy access to the internet?

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After showing the Network Monitor, reload the page in the top part of the tab to see what happens as you are (re)loading.

Proxy servers may discard some requests for policy reasons, so yes, a proxy could matter.

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jscher2000 said

After showing the Network Monitor, reload the page in the top part of the tab to see what happens as you are (re)loading. Proxy servers may discard some requests for policy reasons, so yes, a proxy could matter.

I've reloaded it but it doesn't show anything. Though when I click on the domain it does bring up more tabs (Headers, cookies, Params, Response, Timings and Stack trace). Are any of these what I'm looking for?

I tried setting it to no proxies but that did nothing. So no dice there.

Is there any way to bypass secure connection or toggle Firefox to allow the connection even if it doesn't think its secure?

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Hi Hiigara129, I don't know how the page reloaded without any lines appearing in the Network Monitor. Even if Firefox uses a page from the cache, a line should appear. What if you reload bypassing the cache, for example, Ctrl+Shift+r or Shift+click the reload button in the main toolbar.

Is there any way to bypass secure connection or toggle Firefox to allow the connection even if it doesn't think its secure?

Not with that error, no.

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I see what you mean. I reloaded a working page and it brought up tones of lines. And doing the bypass cache shows no change. Does Mozilla provide any direct tech support or should I be trying to contact them directly with this issue?

Modified by Hiigara129

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Hiigara129 said

I reloaded a working page and it brought up tones of lines. And doing the bypass cache shows no change.

Do you notice any pattern of which requests are successful and which ones are not? A 200 or 304 at the left margin indicates success (new or cached), while higher numbered codes or missing codes indicate a problem.

Does Mozilla provide any direct tech support or should I be trying to contact them directly with this issue?

This is it. We're still diagnosing, so I think it's premature to file a bug report. However, you could gather additional information by opening threads on these sites if you like:

If you do that, please summarize what you've tried already to avoid having multiple people starting from zero.

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There are no requests that show up in the error pages. jscher2000 said

Hiigara129 said
I reloaded a working page and it brought up tones of lines. And doing the bypass cache shows no change.

Do you notice any pattern of which requests are successful and which ones are not? A 200 or 304 at the left margin indicates success (new or cached), while higher numbered codes or missing codes indicate a problem.

Does Mozilla provide any direct tech support or should I be trying to contact them directly with this issue?

This is it. We're still diagnosing, so I think it's premature to file a bug report. However, you could gather additional information by opening threads on these sites if you like:

If you do that, please summarize what you've tried already to avoid having multiple people starting from zero.

There are no requests that show up in the error pages.

Honestly it's kinda BS that Mozilla expects users to rely on each other to fix issues in their product. No offence. Also, I'm really thinking that it's something in the 1803 Windows update that broke it. If its that then Firefox needs to patch it or something.

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The Network Monitor is for sites that are not loading correctly (like that super-tall screenshot you posted), not for error pages.

If you can find someone to donate money for paid tech support staff, I don't think Mozilla will turn it down.

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OK I just tried creating a new profile and under it my Gmail opened! So that means the issue is somewhere in my profile. Is there any kind of error program to run to check where I need to focus on?

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One possible difference would be add-ons.

Another would be preferences that are saved in the respective folders' prefs.js file. These files contain the customized preference as well as some accumulated data that isn't likely to be important like printer settings and cache capacity.

But the Refresh would have wiped out the add-ons and prefs.js file, so it's hard to know what else to check.

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Chosen Solution

OK I just switched back to my original profile and shockingly its working! I have no idea how that did anything but I can get back on ALL the messed up sites. Thanks for all your help.