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iPhone cannot verify server identity

Today whenever I enter my e-mail on iOS 10, iPhone 7 a message pops up with 'cannot verify server identity'...previosly this gave you the option to continue, details or cancel...now on iOS 10 the continue option has been dropped so I cannot simply click and get my e-mails...does anyone know how to fix? I have searched online with no joy as all are much older versions of iOS. or based on safari issues.

[Re-Titled by Host]

iPhone 7, iOS 10.0.3

Posted on Oct 19, 2016 1:33 AM

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Question marked as Best reply

Posted on Jan 14, 2017 12:44 PM

I had this Same Problem and what I kept doing was Deleting email and then adding back, but that didn't fix

So after a lot of trouble shooting this was what Solved it so I could get the Continue to be able to Trust Certificate

1st Delete the Email Account that's giving you Trouble


2nd Go back to Settings and then Mail then Click on Accounts then click on another email account that you have on there click on it then Outgoing Mail Server

After getting to the Outgoing Mail Server Click on the Email that you deleted in 1st step then Scoll down and

Delete the Server!

3rd and Last Re Add Email Account and the Contiue will pop up to Verify Server


If you need help feel free to message me

126 replies

Jan 26, 2017 7:16 PM in response to Brian Bard

I had this Same Problem and what I kept doing was Deleting email and then adding back, but that didn't fix

So after a lot of trouble shooting this was what Solved it so I could get the Continue to be able to Trust Certificate

1st Delete the Email Account that's giving you Trouble


2nd Go back to Settings and then Mail then Click on Accounts then click on another email account that you have on there click on it then Outgoing Mail Server

After getting to the Outgoing Mail Server Click on the Email that you deleted in 1st step then Scoll down and

Delete the Server!

3rd and Last Re Add Email Account and the Contiue will pop up to Verify Server


If you need help feel free to message me

Mar 9, 2017 2:57 PM in response to GolfProAL

Note: this fixes the issue of "cannot verify server identity" having no Continue/Details-Trust buttons when creating an Exchangemail account. This also assumes you have already reset your network information.This seems bonkers. Just go with me, I promise you.


Solution as of 03/09/2017 for EXCHANGE accounts:


- Mail -> Accounts -> Add New Account -> Exchange

- Type in random characters (like 'a') in the email address and password fields and click Continue

- Type in random characters in the email address, passwords, and username fields.

- TYPE IN YOUR CORRECT SERVER INFORMATION (ie: mail.domain.org)

- Click Next

- TADAH! Click Details -> Trust

- You will receive an error message saying invalid username/password; Change all other fields (domain, email address, username, password) to the correct credentials.

- Presto kablamo, you got yourself a working account.


My only thoughts as to why this is a thing is maybe IOS devices query the username/email/password information prior to asking the domain if it has a certificate.. Your domain will respond "Well, yes, this information is correct that you have provided me", and the IOS device will think WELL SUPER GOSH THANKS! and not hear the domain when it says "here's your certificate". In doing it the way above, the username/email/password information is incorrect, so the domain goes "Nope! But here's a cert" to which your device says, Well phooey. Hey thanks for the certificate Maybe they typed their info incorrectly?


shrug. This works.

Mar 12, 2017 7:09 PM in response to GolfProAL

We started having this issue recently and none of the steps i saw worked. Maybe because the email setup is different. one major factor is that the phone did not give you the option to trust or accept the untrusted certificate. We are connecting via SSL, to our exchange server. Issue i used to resolve it was on the mobile config file i enabled untrusted TLS accepting(this was initially disabled) . i then exported our exchange cert and added to the mobile config. exchange was able to sync after reinstalling and users were able to accept the certificate.


guess a FYI who may still have issues since i had to spend a weekend playing around with the phone and certification issue. phones were using version 10.2.1

Mar 12, 2017 7:10 PM in response to lulujunqueira

We started having this issue recently and none of the steps i saw worked. Maybe because the email setup is different. one major factor is that the phone did not give you the option to trust or accept the untrusted certificate. We are connecting via SSL, to our exchange server. Issue i used to resolve it was on the mobile config file i enabled untrusted TLS accepting(this was initially disabled) . i then exported our exchange cert and added to the mobile config. exchange was able to sync after reinstalling and users were able to accept the certificate.


guess a FYI who may still have issues since i had to spend a weekend playing around with the phone and certification issue. phones were using version 10.2.1

Mar 12, 2017 7:45 PM in response to GolfProAL

I had this Same Problem and what I kept doing was Deleting email and then adding back, but that didn't fix

So after a lot of trouble shooting this was what Solved it so I could get the Continue to be able to Trust Certificate

1st Delete the Email Account that's giving you Trouble


2nd Go back to Settings and then Mail then Click on Accounts then click on another email account that you have on there click on it then Outgoing Mail Server

After getting to the Outgoing Mail Server Click on the Email that you deleted in 1st step then Scoll down and

Delete the Server!

3rd and Last Re Add Email Account and the Contiue will pop up to Verify Server


If you need help feel free to message me

Mar 21, 2017 9:54 AM in response to GolfProAL

Have no fear. i found the solution after Googling here and there. God might not help you with your problems but Google does!


Anyway, hereby the solutions:


I did the last. Click off SSL and then done and all my e-mails came in!!! You're welcome!🙂😎



IOS 10.1.1 -- Mail settings are IMAP, SSL is off. Clicking on "More Details" brings up a screen with tons of info but -- unlike my desktop Mac -- no checkbox to allow Trusting.


User uploaded file

Knox
11 Points
2016-12-08 5:27 pm EST


If you are on the Wifi network, try testing with the wifi disabled. If you are not on a wifi network, try connecting to one and testing again.


As a test, try alternating your email settings. For example, since you are using the "non-SSL" settings, try the SSL settings instead.


Mar 21, 2017 10:34 AM in response to Alexander_the_Great

Alexander_the_Great wrote:


Have no fear. i found the solution after Googling here and there. God might not help you with your problems but Google does!


Anyway, hereby the solutions:


I did the last. Click off SSL and then done and all my e-mails came in!!! You're welcome!🙂😎


Right. And by clicking off SSL that means that all of your emails are now readable by anyone sharing an unsecured network at the same time you are (such as Starbucks, or any network that does not have a lock symbol next to it when viewing WiFi networks).

May 3, 2017 2:41 PM in response to bearbeaty

Thanks bearbeaty, that did the trick. It seems that you have discovered a bug in at least in iOS 10.3.1, which I can confirm as being prone to this problem. iOS 10.3.1 on my friend's iPhone 6+ does not delete the outgoing server configuration when deleting the email account. And when adding the same account back to iOS, it does not properly overwrite the previously configured outgoing configuration and update the SSL certificate. By separately deleting the outgoing configuration as you have described, a new certificate can be saved to the account configuration thus solving the issues we have been having with SSL certificates not being accepted.

May 3, 2017 4:34 PM in response to rezolution studios

rezolution studios wrote:


Thanks bearbeaty, that did the trick. It seems that you have discovered a bug in at least in iOS 10.3.1, which I can confirm as being prone to this problem. iOS 10.3.1 on my friend's iPhone 6+ does not delete the outgoing server configuration when deleting the email account. And when adding the same account back to iOS, it does not properly overwrite the previously configured outgoing configuration and update the SSL certificate. By separately deleting the outgoing configuration as you have described, a new certificate can be saved to the account configuration thus solving the issues we have been having with SSL certificates not being accepted.

It's not a bug in 10.3.1; it is a feature that has been in every version of iOS for 10 years (as well as almost all computer email clients in Windows, Mac, and Linux). Outgoing servers are managed independently of incoming for good reason; it is common for SMTP servers to be used for multiple accounts, so if you delete an incoming server and it automatically deleted the outgoing server that was associated that could screw up other email accounts. For example, I have 3 email accounts that use the same SMTP server because they are hosted by the same ISP.


The exceptions are fully integrated email solutions, most notably Microsoft Exchange and iCloud. These don't have separate SMTP servers, as the same server handles both incoming and outgoing traffic.

May 3, 2017 9:32 PM in response to Lawrence Finch

You misunderstood. The bug is that iOS 10.3.1 is not allowing the normal update/replacement of expired SSL certificates in the SMTP config. You shouldn't need to scrub the outgoing server config and re-enter all info to utilize a new cert. In previous versions of iOS and in Mac OS, etc., when a cert expires you can click on "details" or "continue" and get to a screen where you can accept/trust the new cert. This is not the case in the bug reported here. Just re-entering and re-validating SMTP server settings also does not work unless you first specifically delete both the main account config with your incoming/IMAP settings and then also delete the SMTP config. Yes, outgoing email configurations are not always deleted when the associated IMAP account is deleted because the outgoing config could be in use with other accounts, iOS, however, makes this less clear because if the way in which it organizes each account and how it buries these settings within its menu system.

May 11, 2017 2:14 PM in response to bearbeaty

Thank you so much for this!

I've spent over an hour deleting & re-entering my wife's email address details to try to get 'continue' to come up (names.co.uk / hosts.co.uk domain email smtp) - to the point where I'm sick of typing my wife's name!

I ended up adding my email account to her phone, deleting her email account off the phone, then navigating to the outgoing server settings where HER outgoing server was still in the SMTP list. Deleted it, re-added the account and presto a prompt over the certificate with 'Continue'. All sorted.

@APPLE: Why is the outgoing server information held onto even if the email account is deleted? Why can't this information be viewed and the outgoing server deleted manually WITHOUT having to add another email account to the device?

May 14, 2017 9:14 AM in response to GolfProAL

So this happened to me after I upgraded my web server. This message is telling you Mail can't authenticate using the information you have provided to the app. If this happened suddenly, most likely there was a change in the mail server you are logging into and you have to correct the mail account settings on your device, but first you have to figure out what changed on the mail server you are using.


In my case, the old mail server would serve SSL and regular mail through the same subdomain - mail.domainname.com - using different ports. On the upgraded server, only regular mail was delivered through mail.domainname.com, and secure mail using another subdomain name on the server host (i.e. securemail.domainname.com).


The account that was throwing the error was on ssl, so my choice was to reconfigure the mail server to serve mail through the same subdomain - mail.domainname.com - on different ports, or change the outgoing/incoming mail server names on the iphone device to reflect the new setup (securemail.domainname.com). I tried changing the settings on the iphone device first, which worked.


Eventually, I configured the new mail server to my liking, but that's a benefit of managing your own mail server.

iPhone cannot verify server identity

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