Blog iconWhy your Apple iOS 7 device won’t connect to the WiFi network

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Why your Apple iOS 7 device won’t connect to the WiFi network

Recently Apple released an iOS 7 update for iPhones and iPads.  Since the release, customers have reported that iOS 7 devices are having issues connecting to their wireless networks.

This issue occurs if the Apple device believes it can’t access the Internet. As part of their normal operation, Apple devices make a secret WISPr request to see if the device can reach the internet. WISPr is actually a WiFi Alliance protocol, but Apple iOS and other devices use it to determine if the device is connected to Internet by sending a WISPr request to a pre-defined URL. If the URL isn’t reachable, the device assumes a captive portal login is needed and launches a web browser. If you want to read more, I like this explanation of WISPr at Errata Security http://blog.erratasec.com/2010/09/apples-secret-wispr-request.html.

If the WISPr request is unsuccessful, the device responds with a message that it “cannot join the network”.  After a bit of research from Jason, Kory and the engineering team here at Carolina Advanced Digital, what we found is that the URLs that the device tries to reach have changed.

If your Internet traffic passed through a content filter, it might be blocking access to these new URLs. These two URLs will need to be added to the content filter white list are:

  1. www.appleiphonecell.com
  2. captive.apple.com

To resolve the problem, simply add these two URLs to be allowed by your content filter. Once that’s done, the iOS 7 device should be able to join the wireless network again.

For customers of  Carolina Advanced Digital, if you have additional questions, or would like assistance or services to resolve this issue, please contact the Pro Services team at service@cadinc.com.

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