Updated to iTunes 12.1, now iTunes crashes every time it attempts to access the internet through our internal proxy - cannot access store!

moogster wrote...

Beats Radio won't play over a VPN but the other channels will?! Any ideas?!

I wrote...

I still can't get iTunes store music previews working through our proxy however. They just spin and load indefinitely most of the time. Sometimes, one or two work. iTunes Radio also isn't working.

I don't think you'll be able to fix this. Check if you are running through a proxy when connected to the VPN.

If you are, you might have to ask your administrator to add some kind of exception for Beats Music.

Is Beats Radio actually free?

I can't stream absolutely any iTunes radio, it just doesn't play whatsoever. Count yourself lucky that some stations work.

Is the proxy settings set correctly? I seem to have a similar issue, iTunes detects the proxy, prompts for user/pass, but can't connect to online features, even after entering the correct credentials, attempting to access the iTunes store, it just freezes, and trying to close iTunes at this stage results in it not responding and I have to terminate it. I'm not sure why, but sometimes (like 1 in 10 attempts) it works. Really strange. Man I wish they'd just use Internet Explorer's engine on Windows.

Well, I guess this is another thing Apple aren't going to bother to fix.

We need iTunes to be able to work in authenticated proxy environments, so that I can block automatic iOS 7+ updates for user groups with iPhone 4/4S devices, so whitelisting iTunes through our proxy is not an ideal solution. Right now, proxy authentication seems to only work randomly.

You may also want to be aware that allowing traffic with the iTunes request header to go though the proxy without authentication could result in somebody spoofing their browser headers to get unauthenticated internet access and possibly even (if applicable) bypass your content filtering.

I can't belive I am saying this, but this problem has been incompetently re-introduced into iTunes AGAIN!

How have Apple not fired their Quality Assurance team from the last time this happened? I certainly would have...

You're right, I am having the same problem as you with the WPAD auto-config script again. Man I thought we had gotten shot of this crap last year!

AL71B said...

Like others, if I manually set the proxy URL, no crashes occur.

Do you mean manually setting the proxy server or manually setting the proxy auto-configuration URL?

It it's the latter, it will still crash, as any kind of JavaScript proxy auto-configuration file will cause the crash. Manually setting the proxy server avoids the crash because there is no JavaScript processing involved to find the proxy server, it just goes directly to what you've specified.

Anyways updated to iTunes 12.3.3.17, and sure enough, the exact same problem is back again. So it's not just you.

Will have to resort to either blocking iTunes from accessing the WPAD file again (but won't be able to use online services in iTunes until this is resolved) or downgrade iTunes to 12.3.2.35.

I have also opened another bug report on Apple Developer, referencing all of the previous reports about this issue. The thread goes on...

DanielK030 wrote...

By the way, I've also contacted Apple Support but according to the support guy my only options were to contact my network administrator to disable proxy auto-configuration or contact Enterprise Support including paying a lot of money. Haha.....

What a crappy response from Apple. Disable proxy auto-configuration? As Meghan Trainor once said... NO

What if this isn't feasible in your network environment?

Pay for premium support? Something tells me that even with premium support, it still ain't gonna be of much help 😁 because it's a bug!

The only way to get around this problem and make iTunes usable again is to use a sledgehammer to hammer in a nail, by blocking iTunes from accessing the WPAD server at firewall level. Instructions are available here: Re: Updated to iTunes 12.1, now iTunes crashes every time it attempts to access the internet through our internal proxy - cannot access store! Keep in mind, that depending on your network setup, this might completely prevent iTunes from accessing the internet. I know this blocks iTunes from all online services in our environment, but hey, at least it doesn't crash! iTunes will function as a media player, and will still be able to sync iDevices.

DanielK030 wrote...

Here is another thread regarding EXACTLY THE SAME issue in an older version of iTunes that has been fixed by Apple:

[link to this topic]

APPLE, YOUR TURN!

To be clear, it looks like this problem was never actually fixed as it seems to be the exact same problem which I was encountering last year. Maybe they just used some cheap workaround, and forgot that they had done this, resulting in more crappy iTunes software being released.

Pavel Khritonenko wrote...

My company uses proxy with authentication. I've updated to version 12.? and now iTunes crashes at start. And next app launches don't make any effects.

Because I pay for Apple Music I don't have any music on my desktop. I use workaround to make iTunes works with our proxy.

I installed squid, configured it to use upstream proxy, wrote localhost:3128 it into "Internet Options". Now all my application works via this windows service.

To be clear, the problem is not caused by a proxy that requires authentication, it is caused by the presence of a proxy auto-configuration file.

I strongly do not recommend this workaround, especially in a corporate environment, as this could circumvent security measures and violate company I.T policies, potentially resulting in disciplinary actions.

The other reason that this is unsuitable is because many proxies now inspect and decrypt SSL/HTTPS traffic, and this implementation will not work with upstream proxies which proxy SSL/HTTPS traffic.

If you are allowed to, then you could simply put the normal proxy in the Internet Options settings, without installing Squid locally, and this would work, as it would override any proxy auto-configuration files. In my environment, these settings are locked down so that the end user cannot change the proxy settings.

iTunes 12.4 has been released! Is the issue any different in this version? Doubt it.

I think it's absolutely outrageous that Apple would send engineers to a customer's house to fix a trivial issue (which was partly the customer's own fault - customer could have completely avoided this with adequate backups!), but won't come to my premises to investigate a long-standing issue with their own software!!

Knowing how Apple produce "software", I'm not expecting this issue to be fixed, not at least for many months, but if anybody finds out the status of this in iTunes 12.4 before me, give us a heads up and update this thread.

Cheers.