Author Topic: Web Shield blocking media connection  (Read 4222 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

onzey

  • Guest
Web Shield blocking media connection
« on: January 05, 2007, 12:51:26 PM »
Hi

I have only just noticed this today but if I try to watch video news items on the bbc website (click Watch/listen to BBC News on www.bbc.co.uk) the player is unable to connect to the media if I have Web Shield running and I have chosen Windows Media Player (V11 installed) as my preferred player. If I stop Web Shield then all is well and the video begins buffering and eventually plays.

There is no problem if I choose Real Player as my preferred player (I actually have  Real Alternative installed) and the media plays ok with Web Shield running.

(Once player is open there is a link at the bottom left, 'Change how I view or hear this', which enables changing from one player to another)
 
It is the same using Firefox and IE6

My avast version is 4.7 Home edition Build Oct 2006 (4.7.892).

Problem may have arisen since updating to WMP V11 sometime late last year.

Anyone else experienced the problem?

Thanks.


Edit: Looking at firewall traffic logs it appears when using  Real Player the program showing in the application column is C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe but when using the Windows player the log shows C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashWebSv.exe
« Last Edit: January 06, 2007, 09:32:38 AM by onzey »

Offline alanrf

  • Avast Evangelist
  • Massive Poster
  • ***
  • Posts: 3870
  • Just an avast user
Re: Web Shield blocking media connection
« Reply #1 on: January 05, 2007, 10:26:49 PM »
I had always assumed that the Beeb would only work with Real Player (I too use Real Alternative). 

However, I can easily reproduce the problem that you describe and that Windows Media Player 11 cannot be used unless the avast Webshield is turned off. 

It seems that the reason Real Player (or Real Alternative) works is that it makes the streaming media connection on a port other than 80 (it uses port 554).  Port 80 (ie regular HTTP) traffic is intercepted and scanned by the avast Webshield.  When WMP is selected as the viewer for the BBC then the connection to the media server for the streaming media is made on port 80 and so it is intercepted by the Webshield. 

I tried playing with excluding the URLs involved (http://www.bbc.co.uk/* and http://news.bbc.co.uk/*) however that was not effective in letting the WMP11 connection work. 

Maybe someone in the avast team may have a thought that I have missed.       

onzey

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield blocking media connection
« Reply #2 on: January 08, 2007, 01:25:32 PM »
Thanks for confirming the problem and the extra information.  :)

Offline lukor

  • Administrator
  • Super Poster
  • ***
  • Posts: 1884
    • AVAST Software
Re: Web Shield blocking media connection
« Reply #3 on: January 09, 2007, 12:35:11 PM »
Hi, I've just tested that on my installation and it works normally with WMP10. Providing that I have no proxy set up manualy (in Windows XP). Please can you check that video/* is an excluded MIME type in WebShield configuration? In the meantime I may try to upgrade to WMP11.


onzey

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield blocking media connection
« Reply #4 on: January 09, 2007, 03:18:35 PM »
Hi lukor.

I can confirm that video/* is an excluded MIME type in WebShield configuration.

Offline lukor

  • Administrator
  • Super Poster
  • ***
  • Posts: 1884
    • AVAST Software
Re: Web Shield blocking media connection
« Reply #5 on: January 09, 2007, 03:58:08 PM »
Interestingly enough WMP11 indeed downloads the video in a different way. In the browser process, with HTTP request to port 80 and the server is returning MIME type application/octet-stream, co ignoring by the MIME type is not possible in this situation.

Currently I don't have any good enough fix. You can however try to add http://*.wmv into the list of ignored URLs. That should help I assume.

onzey

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield blocking media connection
« Reply #6 on: January 09, 2007, 05:43:54 PM »
Just tried adding http://*.wmv into the list of ignored URLs and it does indeed allow the media content to play. Thanks.  :)

Offline alanrf

  • Avast Evangelist
  • Massive Poster
  • ***
  • Posts: 3870
  • Just an avast user
Re: Web Shield blocking media connection
« Reply #7 on: January 10, 2007, 07:41:43 AM »
Lukas

thanks for the workaround.

It seems you were almost surprised to confirm what I told you about the WMP 11 connection.