No more access to the RWTH e-mail service? Why is that?
At the beginning of 2020, the browser vendors Mozilla, Google and Microsoft decided to no longer support the encryption protocols TLS 1.0 and TLS 1.1. By now, these protocols are considered as unsafe and show security gaps. That is why the IT Center has also decided to disable both of these protocols for the RWTH e-mail service. As of 13.01.2020, those protocols were replaced by TLS 1.2.
Safety first! Security on your devices is of high priority.
Source: Pixabay
Consequently, the following systems can no longer connect to the central mail system of the RWTH:
- Android 4.3 and older
- Internet Explorer 7-10 under Windows Vista/Windows 7
- Safari 5.1.9 and Safari 6.0.4 under OS X 10.6.8 and OS X 10.8.4
In addition, the following cipher suites have also been disabled as being also considered too weak:
- TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA
- TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA384
- TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_128_CBC_SHA
- TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_128_CBC_SHA256
The deactivation of the encryption protocols TLS 1.0 and TLS 1.1 coincides with the end of support for Windows 7. This may also cause problems, for example when using clients like Outlook. The reason for this issue is that TLS 1.2 is not enabled in the Windows 7 WinHTTP subsystem used by Outlook for proxy servers.
Here’s how to fix the issue
In case you cannot access to the RWTH e-mail service, we recommend you to update the version of your browser and operating system. An upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 10 is strongly recommended. If you are using Windows 7 and an upgrade to Windows 10 is not possible, make sure you check out the instructions on the Microsoft Support Website to fix the Problem. Otherwise your computer may not be sufficiently protected anymore.
However, this upgrade to Windows 10 is indispensable for the RWTH institutes computers, as security must be guaranteed by the institutes. If you have any problems or questions regarding this upgrade within your institute, you should contact the local administrators within your institute.
Responsible for the content of this article is Stéphanie Bauens.
