OpenVPN greatly improves your online privacy. Often, OpenVPN clients do not work correctly and show up connection errors too.
One such error is “OpenVPN error 10054“. Unfortunately, it happens when the OpenVPN server connection gets a reset.
At Bobcares, we solve OpenVPN connection errors for our customers as part of our Managed VPN Services.
Today, we’ll see how our Support Engineers diagnose and fix “OpenVPN error 10054”.
What causes “OpenVPN error 10054”?
OpenVPN works on a client-server model. In simple words, the OpenVPN client initiates a connection to the OpenVPN server. Further, all communication happens via this channel. That’s how OpenVPN take care of the privacy of user data.
At times, when this connection is reset, it shows the error:
Jan 23 17:41:39 2019 read UDP: Unknown error (code=10054)
Jan 23 17:42:10 2019 TLS Error: TLS key negotiation failed to occur within 60 seconds (check your network connectivity)
Jan 23 17:42:10 2019 TLS Error: TLS handshake failedThis errors shows that the UDP packets could not make it to the OpenVPN server.
Now, let’s see the top reasons that can cause this connection reset error.
1. Wrong firewall settings
Primarily, VPN connection reset can happen due to the wrong Firewall settings on the computer that runs the OpenVPN client. As the firewall blocks the connection, the data packets do not even reach the server.
Sometimes, even the firewall at the Internet Service Provider (ISP) also can cause OpenVPN error.
Recently, when a customer reported problems with OpenVPN error 10054, it was the ISP firewall affecting the connection. Here, the ISP router was assigning all the devices the same public IP address, which created conflict.
2. Wrong port forwarding
Whenever VPN uses Network Address Translation aka NAT firewall, then there is a need for remote port forwarding. Here, port forwarding forwards all incoming connections with a matching port number to the internal computer with specific address.
However, when there are wrong port forwarding rules set in the OpenVPN server, it can again result in “OpenVPN error 10054.”
How we fix “OpenVPN error 10054”
We just saw the typical causes for the error. Now, let’s take a look on how our Support Engineers fix the OpenVPN connection.
1. Check server connection
Firstly, we check the connection from the home computer to the OpenVPN server. For this, we use the telnet command in the format
telnet <VPN address> <port>If the connection do not work properly, we then check on the server side to see if there are connections reaching the OpenVPN server from this particular client.
2. Disabling firewall
If connections are not even reaching the server, obviously the client computer firewall will have a role in it. To isolate this firewall dependency, our Dedicated Engineers suggest customers to completely turn off firewall and repeat the telnet check. For example, in case of Windows customers, we ask them to disable Windows Firewall completely and try connecting.
Again, if there are further error messages, it means there is something beyond the computer firewall.
3. Edit port forwarding rules
At this point, we check the port forwarding rules in the OpenVPN server. We look for typos in the rules and fix them. That solves the OpenVPN error 10054, and make OpenVPN work fine.
[Are you getting “OpenVPN error 10054“? Our VPN experts can easily fix it for you.]
Conclusion
In short, OpenVPN error 10054 happens mainly due to firewall settings or wrong port forwarding rules in the OpenVPN server. Today, we saw the typical reasons for the error and how our Support Engineers restore VPN connectivity.
Remember to check for any third-party anti-virus or anti-malware software you may be running, and not just Windows Firewall alone.
If those have web/network and application “shields”, etc. you should be able to whitelist OpenVPN or add as an exception.