[Smoothwall/LGfL] YouTube video player not loading

[DeGrimmy]

Morning all,

 

Has anyone had any issues this morning with YouTube, where the video player does not load? The rest of the page loads as expected, but there is a big blank space where the video player should be (see image below). As far as we know, we didn't have the issue yesterday.

 

 

We have a Smoothwall S9 box running Leeds-63 and LGfL provide our internet connection. I've tried adding my computer to Exceptions, but this does not help. We've also tried YouTube at the primary school we also look after and theirs is working as normal, so it appears to be something on our end.

 

If anyone has any advice or things to check, I'd be very grateful!

[OLPTech]

We're having the exact same issue and we have Smoothwall but on leeds 62

[ifarmery1234]

WE are having the same, it appears to be detecting and blocking the adverts from what I can see in the logs stopping the videos loading at all

[DeGrimmy]

Interesting, thanks - It's annoying we're all having the same issue, but somewhat relieving that it's not just us!

 

Looking through the web filter logs, I can see this URL:

https://www.youtube.com/error_204?t=jserror&level=WARNING&client.name=1&client.version=2.20221104.02.00&msg=Unexpected%20end%20of%20input&type=SyntaxError&client.params=unhandled%20window%20error&stack=SyntaxError%3A%20Unexpected%20end%20of%20input

 

I don't really know what this means, but it would be interesting if you were seeing the same?

 

EDIT: We may try a reboot of the Smoothwall box when we're able to - Probably at break time (11ish). If we do, I'll let you know if this helps.

Edited November 8, 2022 by DeGrimmy

[OLPTech]

I just tried enabling ads to see if it was the ad blocking causing the issue however still occurring so doesn't seem to be that.

[OLPTech]

I can confirm we're getting this URL error as well. I have opened a ticket with Smoothwall to see what they say

[DeGrimmy]

I can confirm we're getting this URL error as well. I have opened a ticket with Smoothwall to see what they say

I've just opened a ticket as well, and linked to this thread.

[DrCheese]

Got it here as well, we're on Leeds-60. Weirdly enough it's fine on our wifi (Both private and BYOD) but I suspect that might be how I've got the locations set.

 

Edit: tho looking at it, I can't really figure out why?

 

Also we found that if we had a video left open before going home last night, clicking play on that will still work.

Edited November 8, 2022 by DrCheese

[denzal2k4]

Same here Leeds 62, it is working for us as network admins, but everyone else is getting the white box even with specific allow rules for it and enabled ads. Edited November 8, 2022 by denzal2k4

[DeGrimmy]

Got it here as well, we're on Leeds-60. Weirdly enough it's fine on our wifi (Both private and BYOD) but I suspect that might be how I've got the locations set.

Weird, it works on wifi here as well! That makes no sense, because we don't have different locations set for the wifi.

[lmgtfy]

Same here Leeds, update 60. Interestingly one machine I try it on works fine with the same user as a machine that doesn't. Same version of Chrome on both. What a strange issue this is. Thanks

[DeGrimmy]

Weird, it works on wifi here as well! That makes no sense, because we don't have different locations set for the wifi.

Ah, worked this one out - I was testing on a Chromebook, which is set up to filter through the Smoothwall Cloud Filter, not our on-premises box. Testing on a Windows laptop that runs through our on-premises box, the issue is still there.

[bknaggs]

We had a content modification in place to disable YouTube adverts. Disabling this has fixed YouTube for us on Leeds 63.

 

Cloud filter didn't need any changes.

[ifarmery1234]

I think it could be SSL inspection, got it working at one of my sites after disabling this for the YouTube category.

[OLPTech]

I've just disabled our Content Modification Policy for "YouTube: Remove Adverts" and it appears to have solved the issue after testing on 2 devices. Will try on more devices to see if it has fixed or is just a coincidence

 

 

Note: I had to CTRL + F5 after changing the policy to see the change work

[denzal2k4]

That has sorted it for us now as well thanks.

 

We had a content modification in place to disable YouTube adverts. Disabling this has fixed YouTube for us on Leeds 63.

 

Cloud filter didn't need any changes.

[fiza]

So removing the adverts content modification policy will that then mean adverts will start showing before and during videos played in class?

[OLPTech]

Afraid so - hopefully they will fix it soon and it'll work again

[lmgtfy]

Thanks everyone, disabling the ad blocking content modification has worked here also. Hopefully Smoothwall will update this and we can switch it back on at some point otherwise I'll have to look into an alternative to block Youtube ad's as they are constantly getting worse.

[tom_newton]

Someone is looking at this today.

[kennysarmy]

Someone is looking at this today.

 

Please keep up us updated Tom - do you advise disabling the content mod?

[denzal2k4]

So it works but we have to ctrl+ F5 each time they open YT in a new browser or clear the cache in each browser.

[kennysarmy]

We're finding bypassing the on-site smoothwall is not fixing the issue - we're on the SWGfL

[DeGrimmy]

Incidentally, our blockpage server has errored out as well, the Blockpage server indicator is red on the dashboard and we get the screen below when going to a blocked site - I'm not sure if it's related, but has anyone else got the same thing?

[DrCheese]

Yarp sussed this out as well, when I realised that our private wifi range was excluded from the content modification policy it came together.

 

I'll be peeved if they have stopped us from doing this tho, I've had massively inappropriatee adverts come up before a teachers video before in the primary so unless they give us a proper way to buy in Youtube premium we're a bit stuck

Edited November 8, 2022 by DrCheese