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There seems to be an issue with opendns free servers

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  • Last reply by miffed214

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(Locked. Not a support question. See bold text for reasons of locking -m)

This is more of a "I found it" than a question as this seems to be an issue with the opendns free DNS servers related to certain torrent sites and the duckduckgo search engine. However any thoughts are appreciated.

While looking for a solution I followed troubleshooting steps found here to no avail regarding cookies (I'm accepting them from everyone including third party cookies and their dogs), clearing cookies (do that all the time as a matter of routine, did it again several times), clearing the cache (did that, got the T-shirt, now I'll never be naked) and checked the about:config setting (I forget which one but it was already set to 20, the default)

Note that I can eliminate these issues completely by setting my DNS to "automatic" however I've been using opendns free DNS servers for years and have changed nothing except when troubleshooting this issue.

The following is a detailed description. It can be confusing if you don't read it carefully:

I had this happen on several torrent sites however I can get through on others but when I choose the .torrent link I get the same problem on most like at: http://kickass.to/movies/genre/news/ and the KAT mirrors... on KAT I can get to the page but the .torrent links are at http://torcache.net and I am unable to get those .torrents at all. (getting the "the page isn't redirecting properly" Firefox error message and the very long http://guidetest.a.id.opendns.com/?url=guidetest%2E (goes on forever) URL

I'll post a few links that I've tried (just to see if they work) below.

http://www.torrentz.eu/ - can't see the page at all, I get the "the page isn't redirecting properly" Firefox error message and it redirects to the URL: http://guidetest.a.id.opendns.com/?url=g...Ecom%(goes on for something like a couple of hundred characters)

Same issue with several other torrent sites...

lazypirate.net I can't get through at all - same issue

http://extratorrent.cc/ - no problem with pages or .torrents

http://isohunt.to/ - again no problem with pages or .torrents


Particular torrents I get the:"the page isn't redirecting properly" Firefox error message and it redirects to the URL: guidetest.a.id.opendns.com/?url=guidetest%2Ea%2Eid (blah blah forever) are:


http://thetorrent.org/A5F7D7D92D8CDE2576...9B.torrent : (getting the "the page isn't redirecting properly" Firefox error message and the very long http://guidetest.a.id.opendns.com/?url=guidetest%2E (goes on forver) URL

I can go on to list individual .torrents but I think you get the idea...

I've had this issue with more than a few torrents over the last couple of days and can't remember them all but further checking does seem like it's either particular torrent sites I can't access at all or on sites I can access but store their .torrent files on either torcache.net or thetorrent.org so there seems to be mixed issues, being able to see some pages but not get .torrent files from those sites if they're stored somewhere else.

On duckduckgo I get the "this site is untrusted" error.


Again, when I abandon the opendns DNS servers I've been using for years and go to "automatic" both of these issues disappear with no other changes. and I've done that several times just to verify the problem and even confirmed that the opendns server addresses are correct, which they are the same ones I've used for years.

I've emailed opendns and described the issue and they are completely confused and tell me "it must be your settings"

Although this doesn't seem to be a Firefox or a Windows issue, I'm using FF 28.0 on win XP Pro SP3, legal OEM copy, Pentium D, 3.66 GHz, and 4 GB or Ram (3.65 GB of RAM recognized by XP, this is normal)

Again, this issue only happens with the opendns free DNS servers I've been using for years and vanishes completely when I choose the automatic DNS setting and has only been happening a few days.

I have screenshots of the errors and thought there was a way to post them here but I don't see that.

The error on torrent sites is "The page isn't redirecting properly. FF has detected that the server is redirecting the request for this address in a way that will never complete. (and goes on to say blah blah cookies blah blah that I've checked and rechecked)

The error on duckduckgo is "This Connection is Untrusted. You have asked Firefox to connect securely to duckduckgo.com, but we can't confirm that your connection is secure." blah blah (you probably know the rest). I expect that I could add an exception but again the problem doesn't happen when using automatic DNS server detection.

I have no problems on other sites that I see.

''(Locked. Not a support question. See bold text for reasons of locking -m)'' This is more of a "I found it" than a question as this seems to be an issue with the opendns free DNS servers related to certain torrent sites and the duckduckgo search engine. However any thoughts are appreciated. While looking for a solution I followed troubleshooting steps found here to no avail regarding cookies (I'm accepting them from everyone including third party cookies and their dogs), clearing cookies (do that all the time as a matter of routine, did it again several times), clearing the cache (did that, got the T-shirt, now I'll never be naked) and checked the about:config setting (I forget which one but it was already set to 20, the default) Note that I can eliminate these issues completely by setting my DNS to "automatic" however I've been using opendns free DNS servers for years and have changed nothing except when troubleshooting this issue. The following is a detailed description. It can be confusing if you don't read it carefully: I had this happen on several torrent sites however I can get through on others but when I choose the .torrent link I get the same problem on most like at: http://kickass.to/movies/genre/news/ and the KAT mirrors... on KAT I can get to the page but the .torrent links are at http://torcache.net and I am unable to get those .torrents at all. (getting the "the page isn't redirecting properly" Firefox error message and the very long http://guidetest.a.id.opendns.com/?url=guidetest%2E (goes on forever) URL I'll post a few links that I've tried (just to see if they work) below. http://www.torrentz.eu/ - can't see the page at all, I get the "the page isn't redirecting properly" Firefox error message and it redirects to the URL: http://guidetest.a.id.opendns.com/?url=g...Ecom%(goes on for something like a couple of hundred characters) Same issue with several other torrent sites... lazypirate.net I can't get through at all - same issue http://extratorrent.cc/ - no problem with pages or .torrents http://isohunt.to/ - again no problem with pages or .torrents Particular torrents I get the:"the page isn't redirecting properly" Firefox error message and it redirects to the URL: guidetest.a.id.opendns.com/?url=guidetest%2Ea%2Eid (blah blah forever) are: http://thetorrent.org/A5F7D7D92D8CDE2576...9B.torrent : (getting the "the page isn't redirecting properly" Firefox error message and the very long http://guidetest.a.id.opendns.com/?url=guidetest%2E (goes on forver) URL I can go on to list individual .torrents but I think you get the idea... I've had this issue with more than a few torrents over the last couple of days and can't remember them all but further checking does seem like it's either particular torrent sites I can't access at all or on sites I can access but store their .torrent files on either torcache.net or thetorrent.org so there seems to be mixed issues, being able to see some pages but not get .torrent files from those sites if they're stored somewhere else. On duckduckgo I get the "this site is untrusted" error. Again, when I abandon the opendns DNS servers I've been using for years and go to "automatic" both of these issues disappear with no other changes. and I've done that several times just to verify the problem and even confirmed that the opendns server addresses are correct, which they are the same ones I've used for years. I've emailed opendns and described the issue and they are completely confused and tell me "it must be your settings" '''Although this doesn't seem to be a Firefox or a Windows issue, I'm using FF 28.0 on win XP Pro SP3, legal OEM copy, Pentium D, 3.66 GHz, and 4 GB or Ram (3.65 GB of RAM recognized by XP, this is normal)''' '''Again, this issue only happens with the opendns free DNS servers I've been using for years and vanishes completely when I choose the automatic DNS setting and has only been happening a few days.''' I have screenshots of the errors and thought there was a way to post them here but I don't see that. The error on torrent sites is "The page isn't redirecting properly. FF has detected that the server is redirecting the request for this address in a way that will never complete. (and goes on to say blah blah cookies blah blah that I've checked and rechecked) The error on duckduckgo is "This Connection is Untrusted. You have asked Firefox to connect securely to duckduckgo.com, but we can't confirm that your connection is secure." blah blah (you probably know the rest). I expect that I could add an exception but again the problem doesn't happen when using automatic DNS server detection. I have no problems on other sites that I see.

Modified by Moses

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Here are the screenshots for what it's worth.

Not sure why I can't post them in the original post.
Mod edit: See bug 718813

Again, when I set my DNS server to automatically detect the servers both problems disappear and I have no issues at all.

IMO opendns is either doing this on purpose (unlikely) or they're under some sort of attack/being used to attack the specific torrent sites although I'm open to other explanations. I believe using the automatic setting for DNS is using my own ISP's DNS servers (which again, work fine... but still...)

I'd rather not use Google's public DNS servers as Google is to commercial these days and I think there's potential privacy issues.

Again I have changed the setting for DNS servers back and forth several times to duplicate/verify the issue(s)... and the issues only happen with the opendns servers.

Modified by Moses