Can't access the website from certain locations...? What's going on?

Hi!

So the issue is rather a tricky one… I recently changed of ISP and since then I was never able to connect to TFP anymore, every time I was hit with a timeout error.

But, for some reason, from my grandparent’s house, I can go to TFP just fine, we both have the same ISP (Free S.A.S.), I don’t understand what is going on right now unless it’s some sort of issue with TFP or the ISP.

Check your internet connection or if you’re using Internet Explorer, check the security level of sites in internet settings. If there are any further issues, call your internet service provider for help.

[quote=RSSAlarms post_id=85151 time=1570497836 user_id=4672]

Check your internet connection or if you’re using Internet Explorer, check the security level of sites in internet settings. If there are any further issues, call your internet service provider for help.

[/quote]

I use Google Chrome, so that already excludes IE, and calling my ISP hasn’t turned out anything (“if it works on our end, so it must work on yours” is all they told me), heck I even tried changing my DNSes (tried the Google ones, OpenDNS, Cloudfare, well you name it) still no luck.

Blimey, that’s a tough one…

Well, I attempted a tracert, and it’s still going as I’m typing this message. (note that all of the IP addresses were removed due to privacy reasons)

[code]C:\Users\Alexis>tracert forums.thefirepanel.com

Détermination de l’itinéraire vers forums.thefirepanel.com [1xx.xxx.xxx.xxx]
avec un maximum de 30 sauts :

1 5 ms 1 ms 8 ms FREEBOX [1xx.xxx.xx.xxx] ← Router
2 23 ms 24 ms 23 ms chn60-1-xx-xxx-xx-xxx.fbx.proxad.net [8x.xxx.xx.xxx]
3 23 ms 23 ms 24 ms 2xx.xxx.xx.xxx
4 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
5 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
6 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
7 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
8 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
9 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
10 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
11 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
12 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
13 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
14 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
15 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
16 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
17 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
18 * * * Délai d’attente de la demande dépassé.
19 * * 166 ms rkhtech.org [1xx.xxx.xxx.xxx]
[/code]

Now this is where all hell breaks loose, I have no idea what is that “rktech” thing, but one thing is sure, it shares the same IP address as TFP.

Buut if I attempt to ping rktech.org:

C:\Users\Alexis>ping rktech.org La requête Ping n’a pas pu trouver l’hôte rktech.org. Vérifiez le nom et essayez à nouveau.
(for those who don’t understand french: “Ping was unable to find host rktech.org”, that’s a rough translation of what it says)
Yep, clearly, it seems that rktech.org is a black hole or a ghost domain of some sorts.

rkhtech.org is the reverse DNS of the TFP web server.

All IP addresses should have a reverse DNS name. (some don’t, but all are supposed to)
This reverse DNS name does not affect the operation of the website. (for instance, Google’s reverse domain names all end in 1e100.net)

Oh! That’s interesting… Very well, today I learned something.

I guess we can call this issue as solved as now I’m able to access TFP just fine again :smiley: I don’t know what happened but I’m glad that the issue has been resolved.

Here is hoping that it never comes up again.