Outgoing messages fail - "invalid certificate"

Discussion of bugs in Mozilla Thunderbird
jayant
Posts: 1
Joined: September 5th, 2006, 11:59 am

Outgoing messages fail - "invalid certificate"

Post by jayant »

when I try to send an email via thunderbird, I get an alert:

You have received an invalid certificate. Please contact the server administator and give them the following information:

Your certificate contains the same serial number as another certificate issued by the certificate authority. Please get a new certificate containing a unique serial number.

what do i need to do?
Glenatron
Posts: 2
Joined: November 14th, 2006, 8:31 am

Post by Glenatron »

I have exactly the same problem since Thunderbird upgraded itself to 1.5.0.8 - it will send for a while then it will arbitrarily decide that the SMTP server it has been using without problem for the last two hours has an invalid certificate and stop it allowing me to send. Usually I can exit Thunderbird and start it again and it will work normally, but not always.

Even if I switch off "Use TLS if available" on my account options, it still fails in the same way. It is making itself very inconvenient by this point.
Glenatron
Posts: 2
Joined: November 14th, 2006, 8:31 am

Post by Glenatron »

After a bit more tinkering I find that the certificate it had an issue with was in my list of "web site certificates" and removed it. Clicking on "send" again popped up the "this certificate does not match the domain name you are using" error once more, which I thought only happened if I was using some kind of security, which I have told it not to do.

I click on "accept for this session" and sure enough it seems to work alright but then for some reason after an unknown time it just stops working again with the same error message and when I check in the certificate in my "options -> privacy -> view certificates" page it is back there.
pidster
Posts: 22
Joined: September 10th, 2006, 6:20 am

Post by pidster »

report a bug in bugzilla, it may or may not be related to other SMTP bugs people are experiencing.
davereed
Posts: 5
Joined: January 3rd, 2007, 9:28 am

Wrong Certificate error- was this resolved?

Post by davereed »

ERROR MESSAGE
"Your certificate contains the same serial number as another certificate issued
by the certificate authority. Please get a new certificate containing a unique
serial number."


I've just encountered the same problem today. Was this issue ever resolved?

This is not a minor issue for me. I use TB for my business email and it'll be a
major pain in the butt if I have to migrate back to outlook or such.

Any solution to the problem?

David
mkmelin
Posts: 291
Joined: October 13th, 2003, 1:30 pm
Location: Finland

Post by mkmelin »

For reference, bug 366189 was filed about this.
jcbouis
Posts: 1
Joined: January 15th, 2007, 12:28 pm

Post by jcbouis »

is anybody still having this problem?
I just recently started using thunderbird and I'm now experiencing the same problems when trying to send email.

any advise or work arounds would be appreciated.

thx
Bonnetta
Posts: 10
Joined: August 22nd, 2005, 5:13 pm

Any Fix?

Post by Bonnetta »

I am having this problem. Is there a fix yet?

Thank you.
rpbird
Posts: 1
Joined: January 16th, 2007, 2:24 pm

Post by rpbird »

Here's what my server tech had to say:


We actually had the same problem with Thunderbird here. The Thunderbird message is somewhat misleading. It is really complaining because the certificate on the server was replaced when it expired at the end of Dec. To resolve the issue all you need to do is go into Thunderbird and delete all the stored certificates for the email server. You will then be prompted to accept the new certificate. You can then accept it 'permanently' and it wont prompt you again.


Also, since I have a dial-up account that does not require ssl, I changed my outgoing server to my ISP rather than my hosting service. That works. I haven't yet tried my server tech's suggestion.
m2usa
Posts: 1
Joined: January 19th, 2007, 1:31 pm

Also experiencing the same issue

Post by m2usa »

I'm running TB 1.5.0.9 and started getting this error a couple of days ago. Using this on a PPC Mac running OS X 10.4. I deleted the certificate and approved the replacement certificate, but that did not solve the problem. I'm back to using Mail or Entourage until this gets figured out. I hope someone can figure out what is the best solution.
mkmelin
Posts: 291
Joined: October 13th, 2003, 1:30 pm
Location: Finland

Post by mkmelin »

Reading the bug (366189), the problem is that the issuer has created more than one certificate with the same number. Therefore to "fix" it, persuade the issuer to provide a valid certificate.
A cert issuer (including OpenSSL users) must NEVER issue two certificates
with the same issuer name AND serial number. NEVER. Once you issue a cert
with a serial number, you must NEVER reuse that serial number. This is a
PKI requirement.
sum1else
Posts: 2
Joined: July 30th, 2005, 11:18 am

Post by sum1else »

How do you do that, Mk?
mkmelin
Posts: 291
Joined: October 13th, 2003, 1:30 pm
Location: Finland

Post by mkmelin »

Hard to say, that depends on who is the issuer of the certificate... But the server administrator (ISP or whatever) should be able to correct it by using a valid certificate.
Sounds like it's not necessary the admin who's at fault, but the certificate authority who provided the certificate who has screwed up. Or the server admin has generated the certificate him self...
marleyy
Posts: 4
Joined: January 26th, 2007, 7:10 am

Certificate bug

Post by marleyy »

I have had this problem for two weeks now. After working with the techs at my host for quite some time, they have told me there is no problem on their end. I did the deleting the web certificates and changing my mail.domain.com to the IP number as suggested. This did not stop the problem. Although I have many accounts under TB, this is happening on all accounts. All the settings are the same/similar. I have one account I can't even send out mail on because of a mysterious SMTP error that doesn't actually exist.

I delete the certificates, accept them permanently and this will work for a few email messages, then I again get the certificate error. I have to delete the certificates and accept them permanently again. I have to do this continually and it is getting very frustrating. I still can't get my one email account to send out email.

So far, I have not found a fix for this very irritating bug.

marlene
tpullano
Posts: 4
Joined: July 9th, 2004, 7:40 am
Location: NY
Contact:

Post by tpullano »

Getting the same also ("Your certificate contains the same serial number.....) and I don't have any certificates to delete!! And outgoing was working fine for over a year...now this! Hosting company is trying but cannot figure out either. I installed TheBat! and tried to send an email after setting the SMTP settings up...and it asked for a certificate, I accepted, and the email was sent fine. How do I get TB to ask for the certificate....or I guess it cannot because it thinks there is a dup...??
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