can anyone give me some guidance with my computer woes?

[Tx Redneck]

Tried that yesterday... the cell phone while on wifi will not connect to taxact.com.... with wifi switched off using phone network it will connect to taxact.com

mardyn

That's unfortunate. Like I said above that is a SSL certificate error in the browser or from the site you're accessing. It's possible that your router may have received a firmware/software update that is blocking your connection because it's receiving a message that is suggesting that the certificate is invalid. There are a variety of reasons this can occur.

Turn off your WiFi button in your phone and see if you can see the site over Mobile Data only. That will tell you if your router is the culprit.

One more thing...Is there any new 3rd party software that you may have installed recently. You wouldn't believe some of things that I'm come across that adversely affect a web browser.

He confirmed the wifi vs lte yesterday.

[mardyn]

Just to verify, I checked the phone again with wifi off, it can access the taxact site. it's slow but it works.

mardyn

[bird_dog0347]

More than likely TaxAct.com has blocked your ISP by a range of IP's they own and advertise (your external IP) due to some issue they had in the past. Go to whatismyip.com and write down what your external IP is, then reboot your router, check again to make sure it changed, keep trying that till it does or contact ISP to ask them to change it for you. If it changes but you still can't get to the site contact taxact and tell them they've blocked you.

[mardyn]

No luck as the IP address did not change when I rebooted the router.

Hmmm....

[LS1Goat]

No luck as the IP address did not change when I rebooted the router.

Hmmm....

It won't change just from a reboot. You have to allow the dynamic IP lease to expire. I had a power outage the other day and got a new external WAN IP because it was off for many hours. My UPS's ran out of battery power after a certain period of time and everything shut down.

[mardyn]

I don't have a VPN to try....

Changing that IP address might work but (knowledgewise) I'm kinda' treading on thin ice here. I'm pretty nervous about making changes that I can't change back.

If I screw up and lose our internet service here I'll be screwed for sure.

mardyn

[Tx Redneck]

Have you not called your ISP yet?

[mardyn]

No... I didn't think they would be there today. It's a small local company here in east Texas

mardyn

[Tx Redneck]

Unless it's some podunk isp, they'll have tech support on 7 days a week.

[mardyn]

OK... some success!

Got in touch with tech support at my ISP today at about 4:45PM

In my initial opening sentence I just mentioned difficulty accessing tax prep site.

He said Taxact.com?

Apparently some hack has inserted a mallicous script that's blocking access to several banking sites and some tax sites including TaxAct.

Said they have a temporary "work around" ready and will install remotely asap and the permanent solution is in process and should be ready next week.

How I was able to access it from my in-laws network (same provider)...I'm not sure.

The next step is to wait and hope they can get it completed soon.

I appreciate all the brain power over here working overtime to help figure this out for me.

I'll keep y'all posted on the progress as it develops

Cheers!
mardyn

Wash your hands.

[Tx Redneck]

That is good news and I'm inclined to think there are one or two, possibly three things at play here.

1. Yall have different routers.
2. Yall have the same routers, but theirs had a stronger password set and wasn't compromised.
3. Their router wasn't picked up in the sweep the malware/botnet authors are running and hasn't yet been compromised.

And it's entirely possible that I'm wrong on all accounts here, but it was something to do with the isp and their hardware/network.

[mardyn]

^^Yes maybe so... their system is a bit more commercial based set up than what I've got here.

Newer equipment too... mine is all ten+ year old Linksys stuff.

mardyn

[Tx Redneck]

Makes good sense then. Glad yall got it figured out and you're able to take care of business.

[mardyn]

Morning update:

The ISP temporary fix was to change the "outward facing" IP address on my account. It appears to be working as I can now access the Taxact site once again.

There's more stuff going on behind the scenes to get the sites/addresses removed from the Black Lists of nefarious locations on line to be blocked.

All quite technical and above my understanding... the tech said it's all security stuff happening in the background all the time.

Anyway, again I appreciate all the help and ideas y'all have brought forth over the past few days.

mardyn