Exchange 2003 SP2 EAS / HTTP 403 errors (924232)

Source: Microsoft Support

RAPID PUBLISHING

RAPID PUBLISHING ARTICLES PROVIDE INFORMATION IN RESPONSE TO EMERGING OR UNIQUE TOPICS, AND MAY BE UPDATED AS NEW INFORMATION BECOMES AVAILABLE.

SYMPTOMS

Exchange Active Sync failed

Errors:

Error Code 0x85010004 
http 403
excerpt from device log (in the case notes)
=-=-=-= Server Response =-=-=-
HTTP/1.1 403 Forbidden
Content-Length: 1529
Content-Type: text/html
Server: Microsoft-IIS/6.0
X-Powered-By: ASP.NET
Date: Thu, 16 Feb 2006 15:35:44 GMT

CAUSE

EAS had worked until a 3rd party product called SiteMinder was introduced to force two factor authentication to the FE server.

This did not work (because the PPC clients don't yet support client certificate authentication), so they removed SiteMinder and went back to the original configuration.

SiteMinder snaps into IIS and had apparently modified something in the virtual directory.

RESOLUTION

Rebuilt the EAS virtual directory that had been created for Active Sync. (this FE server was only configured for Active Sync, it is not serving OWA and does not have an Exchange Virtual directory. The default web site has been stopped and OMA/EAS are set up under a new EAS virtual directory)

DISCLAIMER

MICROSOFT AND/OR ITS RESPECTIVE SUPPLIERS MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS ABOUT THE SUITABILITY OF THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THE DOCUMENTS AND RELATED GRAPHICS PUBLISHED ON THIS WEBSITE FOR ANY PURPOSE. THE DOCUMENTS AND RELATED GRAPHICS PUBLISHED ON THIS WEBSITE COULD INCLUDE TECHNICAL INACCURACIES OR TYPOGRAPHICAL ERRORS. CHANGES ARE PERIODICALLY ADDED TO THE INFORMATION HEREIN. MICROSOFT AND/OR ITS RESPECTIVE SUPPLIERS MAY MAKE IMPROVEMENTS AND/OR CHANGES IN THE PRODUCT(S) AND/OR THE PROGRAM(S) DESCRIBED HEREIN AT ANY TIME.

For more information on the terms of use, click on the link below:
http://support.microsoft.com/tou/