AOL email password issue

It may seem odd, but I have seen stranger things happen. One day something works and the next day, you get dumped on. Did you look at the AOL help website that I posted in my first response? AOL suggested that you delete the email account and add it back again. You are supposed to be prompted to to verify when you reinstall the account in the mail app. Alternatively, AOL also suggests using an app password. They also suggest downloading the app.

I eventually turned on 2FA authentication, but that’s only for logging on in aol.com. Nothing in the help article actually worked for me. But whatever I did, it is now working even though I get the password missing message on occasion.

This won’t work on the iPad, but you could download the AOL app on the phone. You need iOS 12.0 or later. It’s not the answer that you are looking for, but if nothing else works, the app should work. I have the app as well, and it works fine as does logging into aol.com on my devices.

Here is the link for the AOL app if you want to take a look at it.

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/aol-news-email-weather-video/id646100661

I think that your older devices are probably not meeting AOL’s security measures. If you are running iOS 10, that may be a problem. AOL updated security requirements in the fall for using third party apps for AOL mail.

Take a look at this.

https://help.aol.com/articles/allow-apps-that-use-less-secure-sign-in

FWIW, I still get the password prompt on my up to date iOS devices even after updating to AOL’s “new” security measures.

I was trying to help a friend last week who had the same problem as you have and he was running a very old iOS (9.3.5) on a very old iPad. I certainly can’t swear that what I am saying is the issue, but I believe that the AOL security requirements may be finally catching up to people that are running older devices.

Like I said, I get that message once in a while, and I jumped through all of the AOL hoops in order to upgrade my security. However, in all fairness, my AOL password no longer shows in the settings on my iPads and iPhone, but I can send and receive emails anyway. Every now and then, I get that password missing message and I just ignore it and my email continues to work.

Are you still able to send and receive emails on the two older devices?

Thelindgym wrote:

Well I have an update: Today I down loaded the AOL app on the older iPhone 6. No problem logging in to my email there. The phone still has that iPhone mail envelope icon

that takes me to all email history . Not sure what to do with it or leave it alone.

You could try deleting the email account from the iOS mail app, and install it again. Your email will still be available on the server, assuming that your account is an IMAP account. I have emails in my AOL a account from over 10 years ago that I never deleted. All of your old emails should still be accessible in the app or on the server at aol.com.

Then I tried to load that same AOL app on the older IPad. It loaded. Then I signed in once. Then poof it was gone. Click on the aol app on the screen it opens then poof gone.

so I deleted it. Tried to down load again and it says now Not compatible to your application.

So, I’m 50% better today then yesterday.

just wanted to follow up with all

thanks

TLG

I’m sorry that you haven’t had more success than that, but as the saying goes, half a loaf is better than none. I still believe that it’s part of the new security requirements from AOL that’s causing your problems. Are you able to log into aol.com on the iPad? If you are, you can still access your mail that way.

If you read the AOL help article that I posted, they indicated that they preferred that users use the web mail server or the AOL app in order to get their email. I’m not sure why they deemed that the Apple iOS mail app was no longer secure to their standards.

The use of App Specific Passwords isn’t unique to AOL. Other mail providers (such as Google Mail, Yahoo etc.) also use App Specific passwords to enhance account security.

When using the Mail Providers own App, the provider gains far more control over “trust” and authentication than is otherwise the case when accessing the account from other Mail clients.

The idea behind App specific passwords is sound from the perspective of account security...

Each Mail client requires that a unique Password be generated from within the users account (accessed from the Mail Providers administration portal). The generated Password is “complex” and intentionally different from the “real” account password. This separation serves a number of benefits. These include:

a) the ability to revoke/change a single client password - without denying access to all Mail clients.

b) reduces the likelihood of the main account password being compromised.

c) if an App Specific password is compromised, the credentials cannot be used to facilitate account takeover. In this instance, the App Specific password only grants access to send/receive email from a specific Mail client; this password cannot be used to gain access to the main account management portal.

This worked for me with my imac. Thanks!