DNS, HDR and losing the will to live...

[Chloe-W22]

Hi @Craigv9,

I wanted to jump in here to offer some insight as I've been supporting your adviser with this case. Your issue is an anomaly, therefor there isn't a usual guidance route customer services can follow. You mention you believe the issue is with the DNS server however after having the adviser ask you to manually change this, we can see you're already on the 'other' DNS which I'd assume was changed by the engineer.

There is no whitelist, no boxes to tick and unfortunately we don't know what is causing only some of your downloads to be successful, we would have no reason to not resolve this for you as soon as we could. I'm really sorry you're not getting the experience we expect, and are doing all in our power to figure this out!

[Craigv9]

No, I'm suggesting Sky is 1 ISP and there are hundreds of others. It's not merely my ISP being blocked as per other posts on the forum

It's not a conspiracy theory...our downloads were working...we've moved...and now they are not. Those are facts

It is also a fact that Sky REPEATELDY refuse to state that my ISP is whitelisted to receive their service

If I WAS A whitelisted they would just say so and there would no conspiracy...

The fact that they won't confirm that I'm whitelisted speaks volumes...

[Craigv9]

It makes no sense to you that a network expert has gone in to great detail explaining that we can't receive Sky's on demand programmes because our ISPs are being blocked from receiving their service?

That makes PERFECT sense to me

It also makes perfect sense because I have asked Sky REPEATELDY to confirm that my ISP is NOT being blocked from receiving their on demand services and they have failed to do so

I have asked REPEATEDLY for them to confirm that my ISP is whitelisted to access their 2 servers and they have failed to do so

The original posted stated that ISPs were being blocked from w of the 2 servers and as a result that 50% of downloads would fail

Guess what? 50% of my downloads fail

Given the totality of the circumstances, you don't have to be a network engineer to work out what the problem is...

[Craigv9]

Thanks for your update...but my unusual anomaly is shared by a plethora of other people, none of whom appear to have a resolution

Waiting day upon day to get updates which are simply suggestions from the post I supplied you with 3bweeks ago is BEYOND FRUSTRATING

You are running an on demand service that cannot supply a service on demand. That doesn't seem to be troubling anyone at Sky. There is no urgency. There is no genuine attempt to resolve the issue

Clearly there IS a whitelistand I am not on it

I'd be REALLY grateful if you could refer this matter to the regulator so they could force your hand to comply with current regs on whitelisting alternative ISPs to access your services...why should I pay for a service I'm not receiving and have to be gaslit at the same time?

[Chodley]

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@Craigv9 wrote:

No, I'm suggesting Sky is 1 ISP and there are hundreds of others. It's not merely my ISP being blocked as per other posts on the forum

It's not a conspiracy theory...our downloads were working...we've moved...and now they are not. Those are facts

It is also a fact that Sky REPEATELDY refuse to state that my ISP is whitelisted to receive their service

If I WAS A whitelisted they would just say so and there would no conspiracy...

The fact that they won't confirm that I'm whitelisted speaks volumes...

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If you are on an ISP address range which is geo-blocked then it would never work.

I don't think there are two implementations of that service, one of which is out of date.

where are these other people? Wifi issues, pixelation on streaming services - yes. I haven't seen anyone talk about 50% of downloads failing for as long as I can recall, and I'm on here most days.

I've never been on sky broadband and have been on BT and now a small indie fibre provider. How come I've never been a victim of this?

[Craigv9]

Ah, you've never had the problem...so it doesn't exist?

Try searching 'Failed, remote network problem' and tell the others who Sky are screwing over that their problem doesn't exist...

What a ridiculous post

[Craigv9]

This problem that doesn't exist ...I see you're on another thread doing DNS checks reference this problem. Why, if it doesn't exist?

Additionally, in that same thread you refer to another thread with the same issue...yet you're on here daily and can't remember this being an issue for anyone else?

Colour me confused...

[Craigv9]

If you look on the other threads you'll see a very detailed summary of the problem

Sky has 2 on demand servers

My ISP is whitelisted for one, but not the other. Hence why approximately 50% of on demand downloads fail

It's a well-known and hyper well explained issue. For well over a year Sky has chosen to ignore it. Multiple people have posted the problem and none of them has got a resolution. They've left. I will do the same. Then I'll report Sky to Ofcom for the anti competitive practice of refusing to whitelist a competitor to give them access to their service. I understand it's a £30,000 fine for each instance

• Hope that clarifies. Sky could choose to whitelist my ISP. Instead they are saying whitelists don't exist and it's not a thing....

[Chodley]

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@Craigv9 wrote:

This problem that doesn't exist ...I see you're on another thread doing DNS checks reference this problem. Why, if it doesn't exist?

Additionally, in that same thread you refer to another thread with the same issue...yet you're on here daily and can't remember this being an issue for anyone else?

Colour me confused...

---

That was after I posted the above. I hadn't seen that thread before and when I read Mark's explanation I actually understood what the problem / suggested root cause was. It's still only affecting a small number of people compared to the other examples I mentioned but I would still like to see this resolved.

The other thread I was referring to is this one!

[Craigv9]

Haha

That makes sense now!

I have a pi 3b ready to go here if you're up for some tech assistance!

[Chodley]

Ok cool! So I think you have to connect an sd card or usb stick as a storage device/boot drive. Do you have one of those?

(I'm also trying to acquire/borrow one from a mate as I think it'll be easier to try to do things in parallel)

[Chodley]

so once you have your storage, you need to install an OS - you do that like this:

https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/raspberry-pi-imager-imaging-utility/

Then once that is working and boots up ok, and hopefully picks up a network address automatically from your router so it can access the internet, follow the instructions in the post I linked in the other thread to install the local DNS server.

Then the final step will be (also linked in that thread) modifying that DNS config slightly to give it a fixed lookup address for the problematic sky server.

oh and also telling the sky box to use the address of the Pi as its DNS

[Craigv9]

Ok, I'll give this a go. Can I trouble you to link to the other post? Can't see it anywhere. Please god it hasn't been deleted!

[Chodley]

Don't know why it would have been, it might have got caught up in the purge though.

This is the DNS install process for a pi

https://phoenixnap.com/kb/raspberry-pi-dns-server

This (titled Simple Answer part way down the page) is how you add your one fixed IP address to make your Q box always find the one that seems to work

https://askubuntu.com/questions/117899/configure-networkmanagers-dnsmasq-to-use-etc-hosts

[Craigv9]

A very kind poster has attempted to assist me with my remote network failure issue. This caused me to acquire a Raspberry Pi and get ready to undertake some technical stuff so far beyond my normal area of expertise it caused me to say...ENOUGH. why am I having to do this?!?

Since reporting this issue to Sky I have had no useful help from them at all. 

They have repeatedly put the onus on me to resolve THEIR technical fault

I must have spent over 20 hours trying to resolve this issue - my own time

Sky are selling me a service, but they are not giving me that service and they show no sign of wanting to. 

The issue has been clearly explained in graphic detail. As has the resolution. The poster with the know-how has had his posts deleted...removing the solution at various points?

Sky chat deny it is the solution but still, after all this time, refuse to confirm that my ISP is whitelisted to access their services. Today's (since deleted) post tells Sky exactly what they need to do and the enquiries they need to make to resolve this, but they clearly don't want to

I am in my notice period and will leave Sky very shortly when that expires

I'm no conspiracy theorist, but there's something going on here...there are numerous threads with this IDENTICAL issue...none of them resolved. It only happens when people LEAVE Sky broadband and go to a competitor...

I presume Sky think that by not fixing the issue it'll force people back to Sky broadband? Epic fail...I'm leaving their TV service too

This is no way to run a business. No one took ownership of this. No one cared. Sky may have a long history of providing TV and broadband services in the UK, but it would appear that their success is despite them, not because of them...

This whole scenario could be a training case study in appaling customer services from start to finish.

Baffling. Just baffling

Go figure

And even as I'm in my notice period, I'm being bombarded with 'sorry you're leaving us, is there anything we can do?' emails...

As it happens? Yes. Fix my Sky service...

Tick tock...