POPPeeper firewall question

[Sentinel]

I have Windows 7 and am using the Windows firewall. I have it set to block all outbound traffic unless there is a specific rule allowing it. I have a rule to allow PP. I have had this set up for years. I have PP setup the exact same way on a few different PCs, all having the same email accounts on them (all mine) all POP going to my own server.
Same setup for years, never any problems.

Now on one machine I have a problem. Sometimes the firewall blocks PP. Sometimes it doesn't. When I check the firewall log it shows that it is blocking PP even though there is a rule set up to specifically allow it. Other times it does not block it and it works fine.

So what on earth could be making this fail sometimes and other times not? And, only on this one machine?

[mjs]

Does this occur exclusively for one specific account using the POP3 protocol? (i.e. Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail etc)

Have you done any updates recently to Windows 7?

What version of POP Peeper are you using (Help>About POP Peeper...)?

Is the problematic machine using the same network?

Do you have any other security software on this problematic machine (especially if it is different than the other machines)?

[Sentinel]

1.Does this occur exclusively for one specific account using the POP3 protocol? (i.e. Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail etc)

2.Have you done any updates recently to Windows 7?

3.What version of POP Peeper are you using (Help>About POP Peeper...)?

4.Is the problematic machine using the same network?

Do you have any other security software on this problematic machine (especially if it is different than the other machines)?

1. No, for all accounts. All accounts are POP accounts that are from my own domains that are remotely hosted by a hosting company.
2. Regular Windows updates, yes.
3. 4.4.2
4. All PC's are set up exactly the same and running the same OS and other software and are on the same network. All have Windows firewall and have the same settings.

I find the oddest thing is that it happens sometimes and not others. It would seem that if something were wrong that it would either never work at all ever or it would work fine all the time. But for it to work sometimes and fail other times is the really odd thing.

[mjs]

I agree, under these circumstances, it is odd to have a random event such as this.

Okay to recap, all machines are using:
1) Exactly the same OS (Win7) and OS version with same Windows updates.
2) Same PP version (4.4.2) with all the PP accounts using the same exact account settings.
3) Nothing at all different regarding all security software for each machine, with same settings for in this case the same Windows Firewall.
4) And all machines on the same network (using same ISP)....
... and I'm assuming all of your own domains are hosted by the same hosting company as well.

What is the Email Client and hosting company you are using?

Considering the situation, my suspicions are possibly the domain hosting company... That said, Jeff would know more about this, as well as have other ideas what might be randomly impacting PP in this way for just one specific machine all other things being equal.

[Jeff]

I can't say that I've used Windows Firewall extensively enough to help you, but maybe we can come up with some ideas.

Can you tell us the exact rules you're using in the POP Peeper exception? For example, when I add a rule, I get the following option:
- Program/Port/Predefined/Custom
- If you pick Program, you then choose the executable filename, and then you have the option of allow/allow-if-secure-block
- Then you can allow domain/public/private
-> ie. there are simply too many options for us to be able to troubleshoot this issue remotely

Does the firewall log provide any additional information about why the connection was blocked?

Can you try accessing one of the accounts using IMAP instead of POP3? Counter to what I would normally recommend, I'd suggest disabling IDLE -- this way, the account has to make a connection each time (just like POP3) and then you can tell if that account was able to access when the POP3 accounts could not.

[Sentinel]

lakrsrool,
Yes, all the same hosting company which is Hostgator.com by the way. A couple of different IP address though because not all of my domains are on the same server.

Jeff,
The rule is:

I don't have a current log entry as this has not happened since I last cleared my log. It doesn't happen every day. But the log basically says the exact same thing as the rule that I have allowing it so it should be allowing it. But I will post a log entry when it happens.

I guess I could try IMAP. I never used IMAP and am not familiar with it.

[Jeff]

I don't see anything suspicious in the rule.

Is there any pattern when the problem occurs? For example:
- is it only blocked once and then works; or does it get blocked multiple times in a row?
- do you have to do anything manually (e.g. reboot or exit/restart PP, etc) to unblock it or does it just happen on its own?
- Is there some event that immediately precedes the block? e.g. it was the first mail check after reboot or resuming from sleep, etc. or is it completely random?
- How often does it happen?

[Sentinel]

When it happens this is how it goes ...
I usually run POPPeeper when I first turn on my PC. Check all my mail and then start doing other stuff. I leave it open in the background but I do not have it set to keep checking. After a while I run the check again so it checks all my accounts again. I usually do that a few times while I'm online. This is always fine. If it works when I open it then it works all the time while open. Then I usually close it and do other stuff on the PC.

Before I shut off my PC I re-open POPPeeper again and run the check. Usually it works fine and then I shut down my PC. But when it fails this is usually when it happens. If I disable the firewall it works so I know it is the firewall blocking it. If I re-enable the firewall it fails again. If I close the program and reopen it it still fails. Usually I have to reboot and then it is fine again.

So it usually works when I first boot up my PC. Stays working as long as I have it open. If I close it and reopen it that is when it fails. But not always. Usually it reopens fine.

I don't think it is my domain for two reasons.
1. If I reboot it works.
2. If I check from a different PC it works.

So I'm fairly sure that it is some kind of transient conflict between this PC's firewall and PP. Odd PC gremlins.
What I have not tried is uninstalling and reinstalling the program. But I would hate to have to set everything up again.

[Jeff]

I don't think it's related to your domain either, for another reason that you didn't itemize:
3) Your firewall logs reported it had blocked the connection

I don't think that un/re-installing POP Peeper would fix it. What I would try first is deleting your firewall rule and re-add it. Maybe make the rule less restrictive (e.g. allow all ports, although that shouldn't matter), and if that seems to work, then start adding the restrictions one at a time to see if something starts triggering the problem.

One other idea -- the next time it has an issue, try disabling and then re-enabling the firewall rule. Not so much a long-term solution, but it might provide more clues.

When you refer to "closing" and "opening" POP Peeper -- do you mean that you minimize/restore it to/from the tray, or do you actually mean exiting the program (so that the poppeeper.exe process is no longer running)? If you don't mean completely exiting and restarting PP, I would try that (that's probably what you mean, but it was ambiguous so thought I would mention it)

To be honest, unless the firewall logs give an explicit reason why it's blocking, I'm not sure what other suggestions I can provide. Not to sound like I'm passing the buck, but it's not POP Peeper's responsibility to work with your firewall, it's the firewall's responsibility to work as it's instructed to. That is, there's nothing that POP Peeper can do to fix this issue; POP Peeper just does what it does whether there's a firewall or not (it can't even know if there's a firewall blocking it). So you may need to find a general Windows help forum (e.g. seven forums) to see if they have any ideas. If you do figure out the solution, though, I'd be curious to know.

[Sentinel]

I don't think it's related to your domain either, for another reason that you didn't itemize:
3) Your firewall logs reported it had blocked the connection

I don't think that un/re-installing POP Peeper would fix it. What I would try first is deleting your firewall rule and re-add it. Maybe make the rule less restrictive (e.g. allow all ports, although that shouldn't matter), and if that seems to work, then start adding the restrictions one at a time to see if something starts triggering the problem.

Tried that. Didn't work either.

One other idea -- the next time it has an issue, try disabling and then re-enabling the firewall rule. Not so much a long-term solution, but it might provide more clues.

Tried that too. Also did not work.

When you refer to "closing" and "opening" POP Peeper -- do you mean that you minimize/restore it to/from the tray, or do you actually mean exiting the program (so that the poppeeper.exe process is no longer running)? If you don't mean completely exiting and restarting PP, I would try that (that's probably what you mean, but it was ambiguous so thought I would mention it)

Yes, I meant exiting the program.

To be honest, unless the firewall logs give an explicit reason why it's blocking, I'm not sure what other suggestions I can provide. Not to sound like I'm passing the buck, but it's not POP Peeper's responsibility to work with your firewall, it's the firewall's responsibility to work as it's instructed to. That is, there's nothing that POP Peeper can do to fix this issue; POP Peeper just does what it does whether there's a firewall or not (it can't even know if there's a firewall blocking it). So you may need to find a general Windows help forum (e.g. seven forums) to see if they have any ideas. If you do figure out the solution, though, I'd be curious to know.

I agree. Thanks for all your help. I am fairly certain that it is a firewall problem, not a PP problem as it does not happen on other PCs. I was just hoping that maybe this problem has cropped up before and maybe someone else has already figured out what was wrong. Guess I'm unique.

[Sentinel]

Just in case anyone was curious it just happened again and here is the firewall log.

I tried changing the rule to allow anything and it still did not work. Only thing I can see is that there appears to be a difference in case in the rule and the log entry. But I don't think that is the issue. Just to make sure I created a second rule all lower case and it still failed.

Off to a Windows 7 forum. Just thought I would keep followers up to date.

[mjs]

I'm not very familiar with the Windows Firewall (so this may not mean anything) but it seems odd to me to have a direction "out" blocked that has a destination port of 995.

You are using POP3 so I'm curious if these are your settings:
Incoming (General tab)

Outdoing (Send tab)

If you do not have the following settings try changing to these.

Also if you continue to have issues you could try using IMAP (as suggested by Jeff). You mentioned you are not familiar with this, all you have to do is change the "Server type" to "IMAP", all other settings will be set automatically (your send settings can look the same as above).

[Jeff]

The only other thing I can think of is maybe you have another rule (ie. not the POP Peeper rule) that is causing the block. I don't see anything in the log that states which specific rule is causing the block, so maybe you have another rule that is, for example, blocking some range of local ports. Or maybe based on your local IP address, etc. And these values could change after you reboot and that's why it starts working again.

[Sentinel]

Nah, I don't think so because the log is showing what it is blocking and logging it. So if it is showing that it is blocking PP then that is what it is blocking. I only have a few rules and they are all for programs such as Firefox etc ... Windows has default rules for itself so they are all default.

lakrsrool,
Those are my exact settings for outbound POP, but not for SMTP. For SMTP I am using port 465.

[Jeff]

But the log only shows *what* it blocked and not *why* it was blocked. So if there happens to be a generic rule ("generic" in the sense that it will affect any program) that blocks any connection on local port 62376, you would presumably get the same log report. And what happens when 2 rules contradict each other (one that blocks, one that allows)? That might account for the seemingly random behavior.

I guess that would be pretty easy to check if you sorted the list on the "action" (block/allow) column as all of the default (and, presumably, your custom) rules are "allow."

So, yeah... I'm all out of ideas.