Can't connect to Bing search?

Connection refused?

[SumGuy]

Out of habit, I never use anything other than google when doing searches. But today I was looking for something specific, google wasn't finding anything useful, I decided to try duckduck and then bing. Problem is, when I throw bing.com into my address bar, using several different browsers, I get these error messages:

The connection was refused when attempting to contact bing.com (SeaMonkey/2.49.4)
This page can't be displayed (IE 10)
Firefox can't establish a connection to the server at bing.com. (Firefox 39.0)

I'm running Windows 7, I've intentionally not performed any WindozeUpdates since the fall of 2016.

I don't have chrome installed, and I like to use old browser versions. When I have to hit a fussy site that requires an up-to-date browser (ie for captcha or sites like kijiji) I use Seamonkey. But FF 39 works on 90% of the sites I browse (I'm using it now as I type this).

I also have Avant browser (2018 build) and it gives an interesting message:

Your Internet access is blocked
Firewall or antivirus software may have blocked the connection.
ERR_NETWORK_ACCESS_DENIED

It thinks I don't have an internet connection, and yet I've just tried it on microsoft.com with no problems. I have no bing.com entries in my HOSTS file. NSlookup on bing.com comes back with 204.79.197.200 and 13.107.21.200.

Is this something deeper, buried in Windows? I can browse microsoft.com with any of these browsers - even IE10.

What is it about bing.com ?

[Jonesy]

Have you blocked any Microsoft CIDRs?

[tangor]

Check your browser's js settings.

Older versions are not as welcome as they once were. I am starting to deny "archaic" versions since the vast majority now seem to come from bots and scrapers.

If you have an ad blocker, bing.com won't display. Needs to be whitelisted, or temporarily allowed.

HOWEVER, I do run script blockers and bing.com DOES work for ordinary searches ... but if I want to use their image serps I have to allow them.

Also check to see if your browser is handling the site cookie(s) properly.

As for Win 7 and updates ... still use Win 7 Pro 64 on a few machines. All are up-to-date and no problems. Might want to consider updating as things have really changed since 2016!

[lucy24]

If you have an ad blocker, bing.com won't display.

Say what now? I tried it and got through loud and clear. (Interestingly, ABP didn’t actually find any ads to block, either on the entry page or the first SERP.)

[tangor]

Forgive the typo ... you will note in the para following it reads "script blockers" which is what I intended.

[SumGuy]

In my "windows firewall with advanced security" control panel, under Outbound Rules, I have 3 rules that must have been part of something I installed long ago. They are:

WPD MS Telemetry IP Block V33
WPD MS Third party IP Block V33
WPD MS Update IP Block V33

I had said previously that bing.com resolves to 204.79.197.200 and 13.107.21.200.

Looking through the above 3 rules I see lots of IP's that are close, but in particular the second rule had blocked 204.79.197.0/24 and 13.107.21.200. I removed those two from the scope list for that rule.

And that was the reason for this issue. I can now access bing.com on any of the browsers I mentioned above.

These rules seem to come from a package called "WPD - The real privacy dashboard for Windows". The IP rules are attributed to the github project known as "crazy-max / WindowsSpyBlocker".

[lucy24]

Is this a third-party utility? It would otherwise be hilarious to find one Microsoft product blocking another Microsoft product.

[tangor]

Happy conclusions are always worth celebrating!

(reminds me, I might need to review my hosts file!)