Apple Devices lose Internet Connection w/ Captive Portal

[Dennis_K]

Hey Everybody,

we use a WM3700 WLAN Controller and we have round about 500 Access Points (AP4600) in our Enviroment. (That are Schools and the Controller stands in our Company)

No we have some schools that use Apple Devices to connect to the Internet. For this Network we use the captive portal from the Controller. After they etablish a connection to the open WLAN they were redirected to the Captive Portal Website.

After the successfull login, they are able to surf but a few minutes later they have to login again.
We have configured a session Time about 1440 Minutes and they will be disconnected after 1D 0H 0M

Is this issue known? Do anybody know an issue with Apple Devices or some Settings to resolve this Problem?

If you have any question, i will be answer them asap.

Thank you very much!

We use the Wireless Mobility 5.4.

[Dennis_K]

Update: Romaing Error is not on Apple Devices only.

I've opened a Case...

Hope Support can help to fix it.

On Thursday we will Upgrade the Firmware of WM3700.

[Dennis_K]

Hi, thank you for your reply.

I tried this:
- remove the whitelist with Apple.com entries.
- install a second Accespoint in my enviroment (for testing)
- connect to the SSID "TEST"
- try to surf apple.com (or any other website); i get the captive portal
- sign on with my credentials
- i can surf the web

next step:

- i disconnect the Accesspoint where i am connected to ..
- the iPAD connects to the second accesspoint
- i try to surf and i get the captive portal
- i sign on again and can surf the web and get the next Error: i try to surf apple.com and get the captive portal
- all other Websites are reachable as well.
- a few minutes later, the apple.com Website is reachable fine.

i think that issue is, that the Apple Device send a inital "whisper" packet to the Apple.com Server and then start the process to show up the Captive Portal. After a few minutes, all is synchronized, im able to surf normally.

So i have two errors:

Captive Portal at roaming and synchronize Error between iPAD and Controller...

I hope you understand my Brainstorm ...

[Dennis_K]

Another Fact:

Apple Devices first of all try to contact the www.apple.com Website. They need a reply from www.apple.com after that, they go to the next Step and get the Captive Portal.

I mean, they get the Captive Portal, but who knows what for "Security Features" Apple has as well...

Maybe the first contact to Apple.com ist OK...then they move through the Building and after that there are issues between Apple.com contact and Captive Portal.

I have created a DNS Whitelist with www.apple.com as Entry. maybe it is a possible reason...

[Ronald_Dvorak]

One thing that I've learned in the NAC/BYOD training class was to remove apple.com from the allowed domain lists in NAC.

From the BYOD student guide....

So that's the way I do it in my NAC portal deployments and I never had any problems with it.

-Ron