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Sometimes when going through a proxy, Firefox gives the "The proxy server is refusing connections". Googling this error produces plenty of results on how to fix it by disabling your proxy, but no explanations of what it means. What exact forms of interaction between Firefox and the proxy server can cause Firefox to display that error?

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  • The proxy server refusing the connection attempt to the port or URL you've attempted to connect to... (or when the browserahas attempted to obtain settings to traverse the proxy)...
    – Kinnectus
    Oct 18, 2014 at 9:01
  • @BigChris But what does it mean for a server to "refuse a connection"? Is it a specific HTTP response? If Firefox just can't find the IP, does that count?
    – Jack M
    Oct 18, 2014 at 9:03
  • I think connection refused is related to HTTP code 502. Although Wikipedia doesn't explicitly state it, other sources do mention it, don't quote me on it :P
    – Kinnectus
    Oct 18, 2014 at 9:10

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We had this issue today when a URL contained an alternate port for an SSL connection. (Our web host's billing panel, accessed through PLESK.)

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To resolve it, I went to my proxy server configuration (We use an EdgeWave iPrism) and added port 8443 as an alternate SSL port. This fixed the problem for us!

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"The proxy server is refusing connections" means your system can talk to the proxy, and initiate a conversation with it, but the proxy is not letting you forward data through it.

Two common reasons why you may see this:

  • Proxy server requires authentication, but you did not specify authentication details in Firefox. Or possibly vice versa.

  • You're trying to access an FTP site through an HTTP proxy that doesn't allow that.

  • Like @AdamsTips says - another reason you can see this if the proxy server is setup to not allow SSL on the port you are trying to send SSL on. I use squid as a proxy server and in the configuration file, I have to explicitly specify which ports SSL can happen on.

There are other reasons - if the proxy server is having some sort of problem on its end, it may do this. If you can access the proxy server, you should check its logs.

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