topic Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally in Integration and Testing

The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

TerryO — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 18:53:16 GMT

I’m getting this error every time I try to send a transaction to my sandbox account: “The connection with the server was terminated abnormally”. The server is not using TLS 1.0 or 1.1 and when I use the production server with a test CC number it is sending back the invalid card message so it is working on the production server but not the sandbox. The sandbox should be sending a test approval response back.

Anyone have any ideas why this could be happening?

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

NexusSoftware — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 19:10:12 GMT

What server environment and application language are you posting to the API from Linux or Windows, what version?

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

TerryO — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 19:13:58 GMT

Windows server using classic ASP XML posts - been working fine for years until I started using the same code on a different page on the site. The production server is processing real credit cards fine - it's just the sandbox that gives me this error.

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

NexusSoftware — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 19:31:53 GMT

The Sandbox currently only accepts TLS 1.2 connections. For Classic ASP, try running the following:

<%
Set objHttp = Server.CreateObject("MSXML2.ServerXMLHTTP.6.0")
objHttp.open "GET", "https://howsmyssl.com/a/check", False
objHttp.Send
Response.Write objHttp.responseText 
Set objHttp = Nothing 
%>

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

TerryO — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 19:42:33 GMT

Response says TLS 1.0 (below) but when I check the site with SSLLabs.com it says TLS 1.0 = no, TLS 1.1 = no and TLS 1.2 = yes. and my server tech tells me TLS 1 and 1.1 are disabled

{"given_cipher_suites":["TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA"
"TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_128_CBC_SHA"
"TLS_RSA_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA"
"TLS_RSA_WITH_AES_128_CBC_SHA"
"TLS_ECDHE_ECDSA_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA"
"TLS_ECDHE_ECDSA_WITH_AES_128_CBC_SHA"
"TLS_DHE_DSS_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA"
"TLS_DHE_DSS_WITH_AES_128_CBC_SHA"
"TLS_DHE_DSS_WITH_3DES_EDE_CBC_SHA"]
"ephemeral_keys_supported":true
"session_ticket_supported":false
"tls_compression_supported":false
"unknown_cipher_suite_supported":false
"beast_vuln":false
"able_to_detect_n_minus_one_splitting":true
"insecure_cipher_suites":{}
"tls_version":"TLS 1.0"
"rating":"Bad"}

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

NexusSoftware — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 19:55:02 GMT

ASP relies on Schannel for secure communications. Is your Windows version > 2008? If so, check out Microsoft's article : https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/3140245/update-to-enable-tls-1-1-and-tls-1-2-as-a-default-secure-protocols-in

By the way, the production API will be transitioning to TLS 1.2 connections only soon, as well.

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

TerryO — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 19:57:32 GMT

I will have my tech check this. Yes, I know the production environment is changing soon too - another reason to get this fixed ASAP.

Thanks for your help, by-the-way!

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

TerryO — Wed, 02 Aug 2017 20:47:24 GMT

Applying the patch on the 2008 server did not fix the problem. So, we moved the site to a 2102 server and all seems to be working now.

Thank you for all the help!

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

NexusSoftware — Wed, 02 Aug 2017 21:05:26 GMT

Glad to hear you got it working. Just for your information, Windows 2008 servers can be configured to work with TLS 1.2 connections, we have enabled many of them.

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

SodaBob — Thu, 10 Aug 2017 19:02:17 GMT

When you say you have configured Windows 2008 servers to work with TLS 1.2 I assume you mean Windows 2008 R2, correct? According to everything I've seen thus far, Windows 2008 "standard" cannot support TLS 1.2 - or am I missing something?

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

Aaron — Thu, 10 Aug 2017 23:11:58 GMT

For regular 2008 (not R2), Microsoft has just released a patch to enable TLS 1.2:

https://blogs.microsoft.com/microsoftsecure/2017/07/20/tls-1-2-support-added-to-windows-server-2008/

Re: The connection with the server was terminated abnormally

TerryO — Fri, 11 Aug 2017 02:00:27 GMT

It was 2008 R2 but the patches didn't work - TLS 1.0 was still showing up (enabled) at AN's sandbox server. We abandoned the 2008 server, installed the site on a 2012 server and all is OK now - AN sandbox sees only TLS 1.2 now.

Not sure why. The patch didn't work but maybe the manual registry edits in the Microsofts pubs (referenced in an earlier post) would have - we didn't try that, just the downloaded patch install. When that didn't work, we just moved the site to a 2012 server. (Hate messing with the registry on a server.)