FTP error 553 is one of the typical errors that we come across while uploading files via FTP.

This is generally caused due to the incorrect permissions set to the files. Or else the FTP clients like vsftpd do not allow any upload.

At Bobcares, we often receive requests to fix FTP errors as a part of our Server Management Services.

Today, let’s discuss this 553 error in FTP and see how our Support Engineers fix it.

What does FTP error 553 indicate?

The error 553 indicates that requested action not taken or File name not allowed.

Generally, the error 533 shows up while uploading any files in the FTP. Again various FTP clients show different variants of the error message. For instance, FTP command prompt error appears as:

ftp> put /home/user/Desktop/FTP/2.jpg
local: /home/user/Desktop/FTP/2.jpg remote: /home/user/Desktop/FTP/2.jpg
227 Entering Passive Mode (192,xx,134,131,24,92).
553 Could not create file.
ftp>

Causes for FTP error 553

Let’s now check on the major causes for 553 errors in FTP.

1. Incorrect permissions

Quite often, FTP error 553 can occur due to bad permissions set to the files and folders.

If the uploading files do not have write permissions, then it will end up with errors.

It is very essential to have the write permissions set to the files so that we can make changes to the file by uploading any contents to it. Additionally, the user should have enough privileges to write the files to the destination directory too.

2. Errors in the configuration of vsftp

This error also occurs due to incorrect configuration of FTP clients like Vsftp. In other words, any incorrect information set in the configuration file results in such errors.

For example, the value of write_enable in the vsftpd.conf must be set to true to allow writing. However, by default, it is set to false. This creates problems and ends up in 553 errors.

We normally, make sure that the FTP client configuration is set properly with the proper details.

How we fix FTP error 553?

Having a decade of expertise in server management, our Support Engineers are familiar with these FTP errors.

Let’s now discuss different scenarios where we experienced this error and how we fix it.

1. Check the permissions and ownership to fix FTP error 553

One of our customers recently created a user and was successfully connected to FTP. But, while trying to upload some contents into the account, they got an error

229 Entering Extended Passive Mode (|||12011|).
553 Could not create file.

Our Support Engineers started troubleshooting the error by checking the permissions of the file. We could see that the permissions were set right.

So, then we tried to change the ownership of the folder to which customer was trying to upload the contents using the command:

chown USER:GROUP folder_name

Finally, after this change, the customer was able to upload the contents successfully.

2. Incorrect value in the configuration file.

Recently, one of our customers approached with an error message

553 Could not create file

Our Support Engineers started troubleshooting the error by checking the permissions of the files. We found that the permissions were all set right.

Later we went checking for the configuration file vsftpd.conf.

Here, we found the below line

guest_enable=YES

If this guest_enable is set to YES, then it will throw 553 Could not create file error.

So, we set the guest_enable value to NO.

This is because the FTP server will consider all the logins as a guest login. As a result, it will end up throwing error messages.

Finally, this fixed the error after changing the value of guest_enable from YES to NO.

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Conclusion

In short, the FTP error 553 occurs mainly due to the improper permissions set to the file and due to the incorrect details in the FTP client configuration. Today, we saw how our Support Engineers fix this error.