"Network Connection Refused"

See if anything here helps:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=300870

Why all of a sudden can I not get into the ITMS?
And Apple has zero support documents, and people have been posting for the past 3 months about the "iTunes could not connect to the iTunes Store. Make sure your network connection is active and try again."

For pete's sake, it's ACTIVE! I'm writing this dang message on discussion forums, and that KB article is a joke #300870. Quite giving references to crappy articles that do nothing to resolve a MONTHS long problem!

I figure with all the money I spend on here, let me know its down before I start tearing my configures apart.

Ditto for me on not being able to connect. Funny thing is my podcasts update just fine. I don't have any issues with my iPhone. I haven't changed one thing on my setup (details follow along with what I've done):

- Read the KB article referenced earlier in this topic
- Same ISP for the past several months
- Have a connection to the 'net
- Firewall is off (I'm behind a router)
- Router config has not been touched in months
- iTunes was working within the past 24 hours with no problem
- Confirmed the latest version
- Downloaded and re-installed latest version
- Verified keychain - no problems. Did a repair too, just in case.
-iPhone connects just fine via my Wi-Fi

- While typing this, as a last resort I decided to Repair Disk Permissions. Here is the message:

-------------------------------------

Repairing permissions for “Macintosh HD”
Determining correct file permissions.
Permissions differ on ./Applications/iTunes.app/Contents/Frameworks/InternetUtilities.bundle/Contents /MacOS/InternetUtilities, should be -rw-rw-r-- , they are -rwxrwxr-x
Owner and group corrected on ./Applications/iTunes.app/Contents/Frameworks/InternetUtilities.bundle/Contents /MacOS/InternetUtilities
Permissions corrected on ./Applications/iTunes.app/Contents/Frameworks/InternetUtilities.bundle/Contents /MacOS/InternetUtilities

Permissions repair complete
The privileges have been verified or repaired on the selected volume

----------------------------------------

-Tried my original account
-And lastly waved my Magic Wand as it was trying to connect

Nothing has worked.

Just reposting what I posted in another topic:

Weirdest thing ever....able to connect now. I bought a song using my iPhone and now iTunes worked. I accessed iTunes via the button on the bottom right that says "Quickly Browse the iTunes Store." After poking around for a minute or so, I clicked on an artist, and their page came up. I was able to get to the home page too. Left the store and came back no problem. Coincidence? Who knows?

I'm not sure if this will help any of you but it might point you in the right direction. I just spent the last 2 days trying to figure out why I could connect to iTunes at home but not at work on the network when up to a few months ago I could. I control the firewall so I knew no changes had been made.
Anyway I eventually found out there is a vuneralability in Quicktime that my Sonicwall sent out an update for on 27/11 which is preventing the iTunes access, see below.

"The problem lies in the fact that the 'Content-Type' header field sent by the server, is not checked properly by the client (website visitor's QuickTime application).When the length of the 'Content-Type' field exceeds a certain length - a Buffer Overflow condition will occur.
By carefully constructing the string sent to the client, the malicious server could obtain user privileges on the visitor's machine.
On 11/27/2007 SonicWALL has deployed an urgent signature update - protecting its customers from this threat."

As a result I cannot connect to iTunes (understandably)and get the error "iTunes could not connect to the iTunes Store. Make sure your network connection is active and try again".
I have spent 2 days trying to figure this out so I've emailed support asking about the fix and also should everyone not be made aware of this vuneralability?

9 out of 10 times this issue is resolved by checking your proxy settings. Many firewalls setup Proxies for their use and they will conflict with iTunes.

I had this same problem tonight. It affected both my iMac and my roommate's windows based laptop.

To resolve it I shut down both computers, powered down my modem and router and left it that way for about 30 minutes. Then I powered up the Modem fully, the router fully, and finally the computers.

I had the same problem for a long time and this is what i did i took the norton internet security off of my computer and then this solved all my problems