Problems with URL not found when clicking on forums.whonix.org links

[0brand]

@mig5

Started having problems connecting to forum posts when the link is to a clearnet http/URI

For example, this link is correct but getting a requested URL not found (this has been happening frequently today)

Updated Screenshots/Images Thread

New screenshots to be used for “Multiple Whonix-Workstations” chapter Qubes Manager Clone Qube [Screenshot-qubes_cone-vm] Clone Qube-2 (Enter new qube name) [Screenshot-qubes-clone-vm] Create sys-whonix VM (Qubes-R4) [Screenshot_create_proxy-vm_r4]

Not Found

The requested URL /t/updated-screenshots-images-thread/5371/12 was not found on this server.
Apache/2.4.25 (Debian) Server at dds6qkxpwdeubwucdiaord2xgbbeyds25rbsgr73tbfpqpt4a6vjwsyd.onion Port 80

[mig5]

I… don’t reproduce.

The requested URL /t/updated-screenshots-images-thread/5371/12 was not found on this server.
Apache/2.4.25 (Debian) Server at dds6qkxpwdeubwucdiaord2xgbbeyds25rbsgr73tbfpqpt4a6vjwsyd.onion Port 80

That looks suspicious ^ you’ve landed on the ‘main’ onion page somehow, so naturally it 404’s. The forum subdomain is forums.dds6qkxpwdeubwucdiaord2xgbbeyds25rbsgr73tbfpqpt4a6vjwsyd.onion, so how come you have a page that has stripped the forums subdomain off? Nothing server-side I can think of would do that, and I don’t reproduce it. Not an issue with your HTTPSEverywhere rules?

[mig5]

My theory is you have a HTTPSEverywhere rule that translates a clearnet forums.whonix.org into dds6qkxpwdeubwucdiaord2xgbbeyds25rbsgr73tbfpqpt4a6vjwsyd.onion but without the forums. subdomain.

That’s the only way I can see you landing not just on a 404 and from a clearnet link, but with an indication that you’re now on the ‘main’ .onion.

I don’t have any HTTPSEverywhere rules in my Whonix DVM and I don’t reproduce it.

[0brand]

@mig5

Not an issue with your HTTPSEverywhere rules?

I’m not sure that is the problem since I haven’t made any changes in the rules. Plus i did disable HTTPSEverywhere and was still having that problem.

I’m not having the issue now (odd?)

[mig5]

Hmm - truly odd! Can’t explain it, other than the unequivocal fact that:

1. even though you were presumably on an onion, you clicked on a clearnet link, and

2. the resulting 404 showed a ‘server signature’ indicating the .onion domain (so one way or another you were led back to, or never left, .onion), and

3. the .onion site was the ‘main’ whonix.org onion site, e.g lacking the forum subdomain, which was why you got a 404 (you hit an entirely different ‘site’ or virtualhost server side). The 404 syntax you showed is the default Apache syntax, that of the main site - if it were a 404 generated by the Discourse forum site, you’d have got a ‘pretty’ 404 page intercepted by discourse itself. Instead the site you got was the same as if you went to https://www.whonix.org/t/updated-screenshots-images-thread/5371/12 except the server signature shows you were on the .onion domain.

As always, let me know if it continues to occur, the precise times in whatever timezone or UTC, etc, so that I can try and correlate with logs, but so far no other theory that would explain it other than some sort of rewrite/redirect rule, and the only one that I can think of in that category that would lead you from clearnet to .onion, is a custom HTTPSEverywhere rule. Truly strange.