Cannot sign into Windows iCloud: get a pop-up with only a red circle with a white cross

This is a pain. The version with the problem is the only version that has the password sync included.

Given that we're in 2023 and this was posted in November 2022, I'm guessing a swift fix isn't likely!

I'm having this same issue. I would love a response, as it worked perfectly fine a few weeks ago to sync all my devices. I am running the same version of windows 11 Home and icloud. I tried reinstalling, repairing, and removing the pc from my icoud devices. It is rather frustrating because I use icloud heavily for documents on all my devices. If there isn't a fix for this soon, I will need to switch to box or google drive on all my devices and stop paying for icloud.

I spent a few hours trying to reverse engineer what the issue is here with process monitor and eventually resolved it. The client certificate that iCloud uses to talk to the server appears to be getting broken in some way.

How I fixed it:

* certmgr.mmc, file->add/remove snap-in, certificates, my user account. There should be a certificate in Personal\Certificates with a Issued By of Apple iPhone Device CA. Delete it.

* In file explorer, go to %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Crypto\RSA. There should be a folder with a name like S-1-5-21...or the like. Go in there.

* Backup this directory before messing with it.

* Open each file with Notepad, starting with the oldest one. You're looking for one that has the string APNSDaemon in it. Delete that one.

* Restart the computer and icloud signin should work now.

I just deleted the file. I had quite a few files, fortunately user Jindong has written a script that will tell you which file has the "APNSDaemon" text in it.

This is the script - "Get-ChildItem -Path "$env:APPDATA\Microsoft\Crypto\" -File -Recurse | ForEach-Object { if (Get-Content $_.FullName | Select-String -Pattern "APNSDaemon") { $_ } } | Format-Table -Wrap".

Here is a link to the discussion. https://discussions.apple.com/thread/254365463?answerId=258575857022&page=3

I think I have another step to workaround this issue. It looks like this issue is cause by issues with security. There can be multiple reasons the security config is messed up. I trust that someone with additional knowledge can verify this.

• Open a cmd prompt: WIN-R > cmd
• Enter the command:

wmic useraccount get name,sid

• You will see a list of the user accounts configured on your system. The string have a format of:

S-1-5-21-...xxx-500, S-1-5-21-...xxx-1002, etc.

The numbers before the last dash should all be the same for all the users. This is the SID's of the user accounts.

• Note the one for the name of the user that is logged in that can't login to iCloud.
• Open Explorer and go to the following folder:

%appdata%\Microsoft\Crypto\RSA

• I think you should see only one folder here that has the name of the SID determined above. If you see more than one, then move or delete the one that has a different SID. (I moved it to a Temp folder to make sure I could restore it in case this breaks something else.)
• Log off and log back on. ( not certain if this is really necessary.)

You also may need to do the steps described by hronk and scuba-fan.

I'm not an expert on Security, YMMV. Any corrections or comments are welcome.

scuba-fan wrote:

Now I get an error "unable to create a directory for icloud photos, please restart your machine". Argh.

• Open the iCloud settings window. Sign out of iCloud.
• In Windows Explorer, Go Quick Access and click on Pictures. (The Windows default Pictures folder.)
• Delete the folder: iCloud Photos
• Sign in to iCloud.

This worked for me when I got that message.

I received a reply from Apple Support to the message I referenced in my post for Feb 18th. Their response was:

• Thank you for the provided information. As discussed in our previous call, this is currently being investigated by our engineering team.

Assuming this is true, I guess we just have to flounder around until Apple releases a fix or publishes workaround information. Who knows how long that may take.

I realise this has been going on for some time. I recognise that this problem presents its self in a range of ways. The suggestions people posted on this particular thread has helped me so I wanted to add my findings here too.

I have downloaded and installed the iCloud app on my windows 10 computer but I get the error message "User ID or password incorrect" when I try to login with my Apple ID and my associated password. I have attempted to reset my password twice. I can loginto My iPhone 14 and the App store using these same Apple ID credentials, so I know they work. For me the problem is purely with the iCloud App on my Windows 10 desktop computer.

When looking into the suggestions by DoctorBrown and Bluesky_114 below somewhere along the way I got an error:

Which together with the suggestions in this post made think that permissions to access files needed for this app are not being handled correctly.

I went to: C:\Program Files\WindowsApps

I right clicked on the WindowsApps folder and selected Properties:

I clicked on the "Advanced" button.

I then got the screen below. The "Owner" was not set correctly so I clicked on the "Change" button

I got this window. I typed my user name in the "Enter the object name to seleect" text box then clicked the "Check Names" button. The correct User name then appears in the box.

I then clicked ok.

The owner name was now correct back on this screen below:

It is not shown in this screen capture since I had already actioned it, but there was a little check box under the owner name which asked if I wanted to propogate the ownership changes to all the child files and folders in this folder, which I did.

So the permissions were then propogated.

I see there is a similar box at the bottom of this window

Next I was trying to actually edit the permissions that I had as a user for this folder and everything in it. I clicked on my USer Name, but when I clicked edit, I got an error message saying that the entry was corrupt and that I should create a new one. I therefore clicked on the Principal setting which said BADWOLF/Users and removed it.

I then Clicked "Add".

Then clicked "Select a principal"

Then again typed my user name in the text box "Enter the object Name to select" and clicked "Check Names". The full user name then appears and I clicked OK:

I was then able to select basic permissions, in which I chose "Full control"

When I clicked OK the Principal appeared in the Permissions Entry table. I clicked enable inheritance, "Replace all child object permission entries with inheritable permssion entries from this object" and clicked apply.

I then got a window asking me if I wanted to continue:

I clicked yes.

The permissions are applied which takes about a minute or so.

I clicked OK to get out of each of the WindowsApps properties dialogue boxes.

I closed the iCloud App.

I couldn't open the iCloud app after all my messing around. so I restarted my computer

Further info to my previous post. I tried signing in with an old Apple ID I used for work and it worked fine. This leads me to believe it must have something to do with my account. I have not yet tried signing out and back in again or changing my current Apple ID as doing so will result in losing some of my data. I may have to if it is the only way to fix this. Anyone out there brave enough to try it?

Further to my previous post, if you go back to version 13 of the iCloud for windows app you will be able to log back into your account. After that, you can update to the latest version from the Microsoft Store. If you log out of your account, it won't let you in again and you'll have to do that process over. Must be a bug in version 14.

I had an older machine with version 7.21.0.23 installed. I was able to find a copy of this older version, install it, and it worked. This fixed the problem for me. New version definitely has problems, not the least of which: if you're going to the trouble of showing an error box, at least have the decency to include some message text!

Worked for me as well. This older version of iCloud for Windows also fixed my original problem that I wasn't able to sync my iCloud calendar with Outlook. I had reinstalled iCloud from the Microsoft Store and then couldn't even log in to the app. Now everything is working fine