Our customers can’t access our public confluence pages anymore

[Abdallah]

Since last week, all our customers are not able to access our public documentation space on confluence although we haven’t changed any settings. what could be the issue?

[Abdallah]

Hi Brant,

Thank you for your prompt answer,

Global anonymous access is not turned off and public links is disabled.

Got more information from our customers, most of them can access our documentation space using Edge browser but not Chrome

any Idea?

Thanks

Abdallah

[Abdallah]

Some of them can’t access the page on both browsers

[Jessica]

Hi @Abdallah

We would like to confirm a few things in order to confirm if the issue still persists:

• Make sure that you are running the latest version of the browser, so it will be compatible with the Cloud environment
• Manually disable the browser extensions to avoid any of them possibly blocking the content to be loaded.
• Run the browser in incognito mode to see if this is affected by stored information on the browser.
• Try on a different browser;

If the issue still persists, would you mind confirming the following, since I could confirm the page/space DOC is open to anonymous and I can access it successfully:

• Users are logged in when they get the error?
• Users logged in, are customer accounts (portal account/knowledge base) or agents (product licensed)?
• Are the users getting these errors if they access them anonymously? (must be not logged in)

The reason I'm asking you this is because I can't see it on your screenshot if it is an anonymous user accessing, a logged-in user, or if it could be a customer portal account only.

We have an ongoing bug, that affects portal-only accounts only:

• Unable to view public Confluence pages while authenticated as JSM portal-only customer account 

So in case users are able to access the pages in an incognito window, without logging in, but are portal customer accounts and cannot see the page even though it is open to anonymous, while logged in with the portal accounts, they are being affected by the bug.

Please let me know how the test goes and the additional information. :)

Regards,
Jessica

[Ahsan Ali Chaudary]

Thanks @Jessica

We will share the above with our customers facing the issue and provide you with feedback,

Br,

Ahsan

[Ahsan Ali Chaudary]

Hi Jessica,

It seems that our customers can access the documentation in incongnito mode and when they are logged out of service desk. It seems we are affected with that bug where authenticated customer account can't access the anonymous documentation.

Br,

Ahsan

[Brant Schroeder]

@Abdallah Welcome to the Atlassian community

It can be caused by two things.  If global anonymous access was turned off then access at the space level would no longer work.  https://support.atlassian.com/confluence-cloud/docs/make-a-space-public/ 

Most likely someone turned on public links.  You can only have public links or anonymous access turned on, not both.  Check and see if public links is enabled.  If it is you will need to turn it off for anonymous access to work.  https://support.atlassian.com/confluence-cloud/docs/share-content-externally-with-public-links/ 

[Brant Schroeder]

@Abdallah I was able to open it in all browsers on my desktop an phone.  Could your customers potentially be behind a firewall that is preventing connectivity?

[Abdallah]

thanks Brant, it is strange that all customers from different countries were able to access the pages just a week ago. Can firewalls block an access on one browser over the other? As some of them can access the pages on Edge but not Chrome.

[Brant Schroeder]

No a firewall would block everything.  If they are all from the same company then it might be a browser plugin that is blocking it in Chrome.  

[Abdallah]

They are from different companies and countries.

[Matthew_Christiansen_Adaptavist]

Hi there I has a similar issue and for what its worth it was because I had both Public links and anonymous access turned on. I turned of Links and access now seems to work without any problems.

[Abdallah]

Thanks Matthew,  Public links are disabled but the issue still exists.

[Matthew_Christiansen_Adaptavist]

No worries Abdallah, I think Brant has a good point around chrome plugins however I do struggle to understand how a Plugin you had on chrome would affect their ability to access.

And if its customer side what the likeness is that they all have the same plugin.

Just a thought... have you asked any customers if they can access it, or created an additional account to se wither you can access it?

Many thanks

[Abdallah]

Yes, they have tried with different devices and accounts.

The strange thing is that I can access it from any account and device using both Edge and Chrome but not my customers!

[Brant Schroeder]

@Abdallah It has to be something with browser security or a plugin or maybe their browser needs to be updated.  It is a user issue and I would suggest that they work with their IT department to sort out the issue.

[Ahsan Ali Chaudary]

Hi @Brant Schroeder ,

We asked our customers to try the access through unrestricted machines and multiple browsers and it seems they still experience the same problem from their home unrestricted networks.

They are mostly customers from UK and EU regions. Could there be anything region specific on Atlassian's end that can be looked into.

Thanks again for your support on this,

[Brant Schroeder]

@Ahsan Ali Chaudary and @Abdallah I am not sure what would cause that.  I have escalated to Atlassian so they can provide any insights into what might be occurring.