Version

Argent Advanced Technology 5.1A-2010-T1 and above

Date

Wednesday, 25 Nov 2020

Summary

Argent Sentry Ultra has been enhanced by adding following two new Node Properties for URL in N1_B screen:

1. URL Auto Redirection

2. User String

Technical Background

The highlighted section in the following screenshot contains the newly added Node properties in Argent Sentry Ultra:

Click For Full Size

URL Auto Redirection

URL redirection or URL forwarding is a technique used to redirect the domain’s visitors to a different URL

Argent Sentry Ultra uses Windows Internet (WinINet) API to interact with HTTP protocol to monitor websites

By default, WinINet handles the redirection automatically but this can be override?by setting appropriate flag

An option is added in Argent Sentry Ultra to specify whether automatic redirection should be enabled or disabled for licensed URL objects

If the value is TRUE, Argent Sentry Ultra uses automatic redirection

If the value is FALSE, the automatic handling of redirected URLs will not be done and needs to be handled manually by getting the real URL and connecting again

Default value is TRUE

If Argent Sentry Ultra logs the below error during Connectivity test or URL scanning or Rule execution, check the value of URL Auto Redirection property of URL object in N1_B screen

Failed to download page
Error …………………………… ‘Access denied’
Error Code ………………………. 403
If the value is TRUE, set to FALSE and retry
User String

The User String is a request header string that lets servers to identify the application that initiates the request

Some servers reject the requests sent from unknown application and thus cause 403 (Forbidden) errors

An option is added in Argent Sentry Ultra to specify the User String to be used by WinINet API to connect to the URL

Default value of User String is Mozilla/5.0

Mozilla/5.0 is the general token that says the browser is Mozilla-compatible

For historical reasons, almost every browser today sends it

Resolution

Upgrade to Argent Advanced Technology 5.1A-2101-A or above