Industry guru Dave Taylor offers free tech support on a wide variety of technical and business topics, including HTML, Apple iPhone, online advertising, Cascading Style Sheets, Web design, management, Unix, Linux, search engine optimization, online dating, Mac OS X, shell script programming and Microsoft Windows.

Invalid or Expired Security Certificate?

Hi Dave. Maybe you can help me with this problem. Whenever I try to go on a site that requires secure log-in, eg. bank, ebay etc. I get a security warning pop-up saying there is a problem with the sites security certificate. It says "the security certificate has expired or is not yet valid" and gives me options to continue yes/no or view certificate. I am operating Windows ME and IE 6, all updated and I also run AVG free anti-virus and spybot regularly. I have searched the web for answers to this and also asked several PPL including my bank's IT helpline. I have done everything suggested but still get the warning!


Dave's Answer:

After thinking about this for a while, I wasn't sure that I had any particularly great solution to propose. My standard response would be to check the security preferences of the Web browser and to try visiting one or more of the sites using a different browser like Firefox.

In a private dialog, however, I was pleased to hear that the chap who sent in this question figured out the problem on his own, and it's a beauty:

Dave, just so you know, I've figured out my problem with the expired or not yet valid security certificates: the date on my computer was set wrong and it thought I was years in the past! Once I fixed the date and time, all of these problems vanished.

This is a simple solution to a vexing problem and, as Sherlock Holmes shared with his colleague Dr. Watson, once you eliminate all other possibilities, what's left, however improbable, must be the solution.

Indeed.



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Comments

Provided you know what the possibilities are, in the first place.

Posted by: ANION at April 7, 2005 9:58 AM

HOLY COW!! I have been looking for a fix to this very same problem for days!! I have worked on pc's for years and have been stumped!! I did everything suggested by everyone from tech friends to Microsoft. I compared my laptop settings to my PC's. I tried altering the installed JAVA. Everything short of formating and re-instal of Windows XP Pro. (Im not THAT anal) Nothing worked! Low and behold after reading your posts I check the date of the laptop and it is off by a year!!! I make the correction and the problem is gone. All I can say is....THANK YOU!! Is there any answer that cant be found on google?? LOL

Posted by: Tim at August 12, 2005 7:37 PM

Just today I started having this same problem and it was making me crazy... turns out I accidentally changed the date yesterday. THANK YOU!!

Posted by: AK at November 29, 2005 6:32 AM

What if the date is not the problem?

Posted by: Rhonda Heath at December 12, 2005 7:39 PM

I found the same problem. I checked the date and time and they there correct! Somehow I managed to set yesterday's date - and the certificate became valid ! :) Valid for that day. I think that is for the different time zones between USA and Europe.

Posted by: Dj_Lord at December 13, 2005 8:39 PM

OMG! This has been bothering me for TWO DAYS! I have gone through articles on SSL, ran countless virus and spyware scans, and uninstalled a VARIETY of software packages. FINALLY I found this site and I went to check the date -- some how the system was set 4 months in the FUTURE on this stupid machine and it was causing the error.

THANK YOU SO MUCH!

I'm naming my next kid Dave Taylor.

Sincerely,

Robert Griffith

Posted by: Robert Griffith at January 2, 2007 5:09 AM

Wow, I'm glad there is finally a solution to this. Simply a date/time change, never would have thought it. Thanks for the solution (to the man who wrote about it), and Thank You Dave for posting it. =)

Posted by: Lauren Dorman at January 6, 2007 5:44 PM

Thanks for keeping this post alive. I have been working off and on for several days trying to come up with the solution. Thought it was AOL's problem and kept looking there for some sort of fix. Finally tried a different search using XP and found you!!! Thanks for the help!!!

Posted by: Bobby Lee at January 25, 2007 12:52 PM

Thanks a lot, it work perfectly for me. Again Thanks, you saved my day!!!

Posted by: nasir khan at February 16, 2007 10:14 AM

I own a mac and cannot log on to google .com, gmail, or anything to do with google... it tells me there is a certificate problem and then that it is fixed and to reset the browser, i do so and bam, same thing again....i cannot access anything...please help me....

Posted by: jamie at March 15, 2007 11:20 PM

Holy cow. This drove me NUTS. Other sites suggested a corrupted IE. The only easy solution was to figure out Firefox or simmilar, for which I had no energy...then as I said to myself..one more click..I landed up here and... read the fix...then remembered I set the time back to make a freeware program work, never to restore it...THANK YOU ^THANK YOU!!!!
Excuse me while I go kick my own ass...repeatedly.

Posted by: JoeSlovo at March 22, 2007 3:38 PM

Dave,
as per other responses,would never had
worked out sec cert prob,many thanks.
Ted

Posted by: edward at March 23, 2007 8:12 AM

Sadly, it doesnt works in my case. I tried putting the date back...putting it in the future..but still no change.

Posted by: Mike at March 23, 2007 4:31 PM

My computer was set 15 years in future. I am wondering who did that, it is for sure that was not me.

Posted by: Abhinav at March 31, 2007 8:19 AM

this problem is driving me NUTS!!

Posted by: fung-lee at April 4, 2007 10:37 PM

We all can't be this stupid. Something got in and changed the date in our computers. How many people here have replied to this? This is a bug no doubt. I just reset my clock because of daylight savings time, twice. I know I didn't reset my computer to 2008. I c'mon, the date set YEARS in the future said one person?
Dave R
Venice FL

Posted by: David at April 9, 2007 10:58 PM

I am unable to connect two XP systems in a workgroup.The error showing is "The Network Path Was Not Found".I have disabled the firewall also.
I am not able to Ping also.Pls give any Resolution for this.Thank u!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted by: kumar at April 10, 2007 7:39 AM

thank you for giving me suggestion to chage date and time.

Posted by: firoj at April 17, 2007 12:08 AM

Same problem here. I kept checking my date and time and it was correct! Then I noticed that it still read Eastern Standard Time and not Daylight Savings Time. Ahha! Sync with Microsoft time (click on Internet time tab in date and time settings in XP) and all is fixed.

Posted by: Sue at April 24, 2007 2:37 PM

I can't believe my problem was solved by checking my date. You made my day!!! I've been trying to resolve this security certificate problem for 2 weeks and nothing has worked. I've had all kinds of help & suggestions from people who are pretty knowlegeable. Thought I was going to have to live with it until I purchased a new computer down the road. Such a "simple" fix for what has been a major problem.

Posted by: Debbie at May 3, 2007 6:23 PM

Hello Every body, i was searching to Solve my problem, finaly i got this page address from google, my problem become ok by chaning my date and time settings.
thank u

Posted by: T.Dareez at June 5, 2007 1:00 AM

Dave thanks for posting that security fix, and bless that dude that found the fix.so easy so hard.

Posted by: bob at June 7, 2007 3:26 PM

I checked my PC's Date and Time settings many times. They are exact. Still I get the error. But I solved it by installing the SOME certificates manually in the Trusted Root Publishers List of IE. But I am unable to do that with Google website. It has an expired certificate which I cannot install. I installed only those which I use. I have Windows XP Pro SP 2 and IE 6. My Microsoft Update doesn't run and my PC is unable to synchronise with the Internet Time. This problems are related to the security certificates.

Posted by: Ajinkya at July 5, 2007 3:40 AM

I am using Vista Pro and IE7 - I was having the same problem but the time and date on my computer was correct.

I did enable "Protected Mode" and that helped.

Posted by: Everardo at July 15, 2007 8:39 AM

A million thanks. Typical; a problem solved by a few mouse clicks. Easy if you know how, and this sort of website tells you how!

Posted by: Bryan Murphy at August 18, 2007 5:25 AM

Hmm... I'd love to buy you a chai, but I'm having this problem too, on my G5 Mac, the Mac Pro, and an iPhone all running Safari. The date on these machines is definitely correct. Anybody else having this problem??

Posted by: Adam Prall at September 22, 2007 7:14 PM

Oh thank you so much for this post..It really helped me..I'm working with this problem for more than an hour..Then I've reached this site..Wow..Fantastic!The date was set on the 14th of October..Changed the time as usual..Poofs!It resolves my issue..Thank you so much for this post..Thanks for helping people like us..LOL!God bless you guys!

Posted by: Mharjie at October 2, 2007 8:52 AM

The system time on my computer is correct, but I am still receiving this error message every time I try to go to ANY website which requires a password. I use Mozilla. It doesn't even allow me to continue to the website temporarily. Any help would be very much appreciated!! Thank you.

Posted by: Brian at October 3, 2007 7:00 AM

>>>

Reply: Brian,what is the exact error message when you browse to the inet using Mozilla?Try also to check the security options under advanced tab of internet options..Just check the settings..Try to uncheck one by one then restart..If still the same,checked it back then uncheck another one,restart again..Just try and try..Good luck..

Posted by: Mharjie at October 3, 2007 11:45 AM

i had the same problem what gave it away for me is when i updated adaware and it told me my definitions were 3000 days old...lol

Posted by: dave tha slave at October 24, 2007 7:23 PM

Hello:
I'm having troubles to login to OWA thru Internet because I get the error Message: "The security certificate presented by this website has expired or is not yet valid." .
The Certificate is ok in the server (FE) and the users are getting the error message trying to access from Internet only. The date/time is ok for the server and the links are ok (https) but the client users have problems to login. Any IDEA, CLUE, ???

Posted by: Maria Deruvo at November 6, 2007 8:30 AM

Had same problem and it was an incorrect date issue as well. Problem solved. Thanks.

Posted by: Rob at November 8, 2007 6:07 AM

BULLS EYES.... IT WORKED FOR ME AS WELL !!!!

Posted by: Yaseen at November 10, 2007 7:59 AM

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!! I have been working on this and worried about this for a few days now. I was about to take my pc in to have it fixed.....you just saved me MONEY! For me I had been making some calendars and changed the year to 2008 and didn't change it back.......I have ran all kinds of virus scans and defrags and anything I could think of. I thought tonight I'm gonna search the problem and voila you fixed it!
Thanks!!!

Posted by: Khristie at December 13, 2007 12:02 AM

OMG -- No one knew what to do. I followed all the "help" suggestions and nothing worked. One million thanks to your chap who figured it out. It worked for me! I almost didn't know where else to turn. And, thanks to you for posting it. I'll definitely check your site again!

Posted by: Sheryl at December 15, 2007 8:54 PM

constant security warnings were losing me sleep.BINGO your suggestion to check my clock [i was one year ahead]worked a treat. Merry Christmas on and all!!!!!

Posted by: cliffm at December 21, 2007 9:07 AM

Date and time are correct. Problem persists. Just another MS bug? Definitions can be 3000 days out of sync? What gives here? Any further solutions for those situations where date adjustment does not work?

Posted by: Schweigenthaler at January 2, 2008 3:12 PM

I can't believe it was so easy to correct those annoying expiration notices. Thank you, thank you, thank you! The date on my computer was one year ago. How does that happen??????????
Ah well, no worries now.

Posted by: Marlene at January 5, 2008 10:29 AM

Thank you so much...I would have never figured it out on my own!!!!

Posted by: SG at January 15, 2008 4:49 PM

I can just repeat the same as everyone else. After emailing IT people and getting mad because they kept saying it was coming from my computer and I tried everything that was suggested or I could find. Finally I stumbled onto your post. Thank you Thank you Thank you

Now how did the clock get changed is another mystery.

Posted by: Lynn at January 19, 2008 10:15 AM

I found that if the site is being blocked becuase Vista supposedly thinks that the "Certificate had been revoked" you have the ability to go to Internet Options > Advanced and under security, uncheck the box that says something like, Check if the certificate has been revoked, and UNCHECK it.

Posted by: Mike at January 25, 2008 2:40 PM

I have tried everything here to fix this security certificate issue which I have been having for almost a week. Nothing is working. Should I do a system restore or is there a virus or corruption on my computer. I am very frustrated with this. Any help would appreciated.

Raelyn

Posted by: Raelyn at January 31, 2008 6:12 PM

I recently emailed you saying that I had tried everything and still had the certificate issue so I went to my date and time and checked it a second time. Well I missed it when I checked the first time. Sure enough the date was wrong. It was set to the wrong month making it one year ahead of the actual date. I changed it and no more certificate issues. I thank you so much for this site. It's amazing how my internet provider and computer company didn't even get it and I found the answer to the problem on your site!! Thanks a million. I really appreciate you!!

Raelyn

Posted by: Raelyn at January 31, 2008 7:20 PM

Thank u sir,

I too have a same problem of this security certificate.

i have changed the date and time in my system tray and now its working.

Thank u very much.

Posted by: naveen at February 26, 2008 11:54 PM

WOW!!! Incorrect date on my PC resulted in IE7 certificate errors. Many thanks. I am a bit embarrassed because I am highly technical and my forte is troubleshooting! Thanks again.

Posted by: CL at February 29, 2008 5:53 AM

omg!!!!! Thank you thank you thank you I was about to throw this computer in the trash.

Posted by: Eddie at March 3, 2008 1:52 PM

Unbelievable! I looked all over for this solution-no luck! After reading it, I wasn't even going to check-it just seemed impossible that I had the wrong date-NO-It somehow changed back a year! Problem solved-this is great-short-sweet-to the point and it works! All of my life should be this easy-thank you!!

Posted by: matt at March 4, 2008 6:06 PM

Some programs or malware change computer date. it is good idea to regularly synchonize computer time with time.windows.com

Posted by: Tahir Jamil at March 10, 2008 11:48 AM

When the alternate browser suggestion hadn't worked for me I had almost lost hope. Indeed my pc was set the wrong year. Thanks a million!

Posted by: Julie at March 19, 2008 8:04 AM

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!
I've been struggling with the same problem for two days -- adjusting security settings, etc. However, my computer's calendar was only off by 1 month! How, I'll never know.

Posted by: Karen at March 25, 2008 12:55 PM

VERY VERY THANKS, I THOUGHT IT WAS VIRUS....BUT I CHANGE TIME IT WILL OK

Posted by: jibin at March 26, 2008 9:34 AM

Hey Dave I could use your help! When I try to enter my e-mail account which is on hotmail i get a message telling me that the certificate is revoked! It doesnt even let me continue to the website anyway!!! Im goin nuts over this so if you could gimme a hand it would be really appreciated. If it helps im usin Internet Explorer 7 on Windows XP Media Centre. Cheers in advance. Sean

Posted by: Sean at March 28, 2008 5:21 PM

I can't believe I stumbled onto this forum! I have had that stupid security error for a month and could not figure it out. Just about to trash this laptop because I've had other problems with it....and hallelujah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks soooooo much for your help!

Posted by: paige at April 23, 2008 9:54 PM

I changed the date and its STILL NOT WORKING!!!!!! whats wrong??? im using IE7.....

Posted by: ~theshadowform~ at April 28, 2008 8:04 PM

The fact that this thread has been going on since April 2007 means its really helping. I too want to join the many gratefulls. Thanx alot, I hope to remmember this the next time I come across it. If I dont remmember I will definately find this link again :)

Posted by: Jason at May 18, 2008 8:07 AM

Thank you very much, it work perfectly for me. Again Thanks a lot, you saved my time!!!

Posted by: Sana Aziz at June 3, 2008 11:35 PM

Ditto to all! My time appeared correct but I reset it anyway and now no error message. I've been at it for hours. Thanks to all.

Posted by: Michele at June 8, 2008 8:19 AM

hi there,

hi Dj_Lord.thx 4 ur information.
yes. someone enter invalid date and time.
i just enter it.
now my explorer was working good.
again again.
thx.

Posted by: Dj~sugu™hervin® at June 30, 2008 8:53 AM

Wow After about 2 hours of trying EVERYTHING but formating my hard drive i came across this answer and you could not belive how rlive i am. thanks a lot dave
P.S My laptop back up battery is no longer working so there fore when ever the main battery dies compleatly this happends, but now i know how to go about it, lol

Posted by: jay hernandez at July 13, 2008 4:39 PM

Thanks for the site mate! worked like a charm it did!

Posted by: mathematicus at July 28, 2008 3:53 AM

Wow! Days of frustration ended when I read this solution and checked my laptop date. It was a month ahead to the day. Fixing it fixed my problem getting into my gmail! Thanks Bunches!

Posted by: Tia at August 3, 2008 5:20 PM

Thanks! Me (stupid) too! I had set my date back this morning to check a date....couldn't get into Ebay this afternoon....immediately thought it was a malicious interloper about to comandeer my communication and identity to buy baseball cards on my dime. The drama was fun while it lasted...
Thanks a ton.

Posted by: Dot Davis at August 8, 2008 3:30 PM

Gmail certificate expired pops up. What could be the issue

Posted by: sudev at August 22, 2008 12:53 AM

OMG!!! This is amazing, my date was set to like 2002 and i couldnt get on any kind of websites to pay my bills or anything...Thanks everybody!! I love this webite !!!!lol

Posted by: Jameelah at August 24, 2008 9:06 PM

Thank You date and time problem who would have thought being a computer programmer I assumed it was something much more complicate.Goes to show do not overlook the simple solutions

Posted by: Glenn Morris at August 25, 2008 8:55 PM

hae i reli need ur help...my certificate expired like 2 weeks ago n i can access 2 my windows live messenger..plz tell me wat 2 do?

Posted by: peter at September 3, 2008 1:03 AM

This is amazing... been working for Dell, wasnt able to figure this out... you are amazing!!!

Posted by: naz at September 3, 2008 3:03 PM

Oh thank you thank you thank you! I've been struggling with this problem for DAYS!!!!!!!!!!

Posted by: Jess at September 5, 2008 8:27 PM

thanks you very much dear. i was also facing the same problem. i updated the security certificate and change the different internet options and studied the SSL state but nothing worked. it will be so simple i never thought of it. thank you very much

Posted by: Syed Asad Ali at September 11, 2008 9:20 AM

Thx. This Silicon Valley girl is greatful.

Posted by: vic at September 16, 2008 9:06 PM

I am using IE 6. I already have the correct time and date for my computer. I adjusted the browser settings but i am still getting the same pop-up for the security certificate. I already disabled my security suite as well. What else can i do? Anyway, the security certificate only pops up when i try to sign in to my msn email.

Posted by: Grace at September 18, 2008 7:58 PM

Thanks for the solution to the certificate error -- so simple!

Posted by: Leilani at October 6, 2008 12:28 PM

I have the same problem with websites security certificate saying certificate has expired or not yet valiD. Took it too cumputer repair shop they said it was my date and year not set properly but i still get it HELP PLEASE

Posted by: j macpherson at October 9, 2008 10:08 AM

when back and reset the time and date this time it worked

Posted by: j macpherson at October 9, 2008 10:15 AM

my date was set into the future. AFter setting it, it works good now.
Best part is cox said I have a problem with my computer and will charge me $99.

Posted by: lax at October 13, 2008 8:55 PM

hello every one
this is the same way i fix this same problem for other people.
but some times this does not work if you install windows XP with service pack 1 then up grade the service pack to 2 whilst having IE 6 installed
then upgrading IE 6 to IE 7 some times this causes
a glitch in the pc so thay should uninstall IE 6
then install IE 7 .
i have found this to work in some cases that the other way does not work.

Posted by: james at October 19, 2008 2:50 AM

Hi Dave. Maybe you can help me with this problem. Whenever I try to go on a site that requires secure log-in, eg. bank, ebay etc. I get a security warning pop-up saying there is a problem with the sites security certificate. It says "the security certificate has expired or is not yet valid" and gives me options to continue yes/no or view certificate. I am operating palm t/x.

Posted by: Waldorf at October 21, 2008 3:52 PM

This error message comes when I access Microsoft Outlook 2007. After that I recieve a delivery failure message when i try to send my mail my mail using outlook. I use Ms Exchange 2007

Posted by: baabona at October 27, 2008 1:44 AM

Still a terrific post!! I had the same problem with a computer I bought from E-bay. My date was set to January 2001 I reset to 10/30/08 today's date and everything worked like a charm. I wouldn't have found this answer if it weren't for yahoo and my laptop!! Thank you so much, it does drive you crazy.

Larry,,Mi.

Posted by: Larry at October 30, 2008 7:23 PM

Amazing....absolutely AMAZING!

Posted by: Tony Meza Jr at October 31, 2008 3:46 PM

Great answear! Thanks a lot.

en effet. j'ai modifié la date car mon pc rencontre des problemes avec system.exe.

C'est la bonne réponse a mon problème. :)

Thank you so much.

Posted by: hashish at November 7, 2008 9:32 AM

Ah people whose computers' time changes without notice, should replace their cmos battery..

Posted by: Pablo at November 13, 2008 4:16 PM

NICE!!! You saved me.

Posted by: Rusty at November 20, 2008 10:07 AM

OMG! I cant believe it, i had this problem and all it is was that the date was changed.

Posted by: Darksolid32 at November 20, 2008 10:22 AM

WOW>.................................LOL
MY COMP WAS 20 YEARS IN FUTURE TY SO MUCH..........

Posted by: Tommy at November 29, 2008 10:45 PM

could someone pls tell me what to find the date and time and change it.

Posted by: brena at December 5, 2008 8:06 AM

spot on!!
worked 4 me 2.....

Posted by: wayne at December 11, 2008 11:42 AM

Had same problem. Went to Tools, Internet options, content, publishers and deleted all that was in " trusted publishers" and all is now well

Posted by: R Hansen at December 12, 2008 10:03 AM

tnx dave

Posted by: joseph C. at December 15, 2008 10:45 AM

Thank you Dave!!!!! This problem has been haunting me for days. I was worried someone out there had all my private information. Turns out the date on my computer was just set back a year. Thank you thank you thank you!!!

Posted by: Eileen at December 16, 2008 1:16 PM

So how do I change the date on my ocmputer so I can fix the invalid security certifdicate problem?
Thanks, Joe

Posted by: Joe Brown at December 26, 2008 4:53 PM

Hello DAVE!

Thank God for this post! I have been working as a tech.support and this has bugged some of my customers for their email access... Tried it and it worked!

Happy New year! Thanks again.

Posted by: Ryan O. at December 27, 2008 3:18 PM

After 1 week of the bloody security certificate glich,I stumbled on your site. Ayupper! Worked like a charm! Many thanks! Jim

Posted by: Jim from Maine at December 28, 2008 5:33 AM

Thank you Dave my grandson had changed the date to 2099. Thank you!!! Certificate error solved.

Posted by: chucktown at December 28, 2008 11:15 AM

OMG you guys are awesome! I had the certificate problem for the last week and for the life of me could not figure out what had changed or where it was coming from. I tried everything security related that I knew of and was plain out dumbfounded. Turns out the date in my computer was February 2008, once I corrected that walla no more problem.

Posted by: Karyn S at January 4, 2009 3:50 AM

thanks to that genius ..the solution is so easy yet so hard if she didnt shared it...cost us some dollars again to bring it to the shop for fixing..thanks greatly! it was a real big help..

Posted by: pinkcacherel at January 4, 2009 4:18 AM

I have had this problem for a while so thanks alot!, its because my computer never keeps the time and date because its battery has died. :(
I should get a new one really.

Thanks again
James

Posted by: James at January 7, 2009 10:04 AM

thank you for giving me suggestion to chage date and time.

Posted by: R.thillainathan. at January 22, 2009 4:38 PM

This fix is genius, I've been struggling with the same problem for days. Thanks for keeping it posted.

Posted by: Matt at January 23, 2009 8:48 PM

WOW thankyou

this error scared the bajezzes out of me i was so scared my info was being leaked...even contacted paypal, and ebay regarding it was SOOOOO Scared...then decided to google the first part of the error...omg...what a life saver.

Thank you dave and the original poster.

Wonderful site you have going on here...glad i found it.

Kim

Posted by: Kim Young at January 27, 2009 1:51 PM

Hi Dave.......
thanks you very much.i was also facing the same problem. i updated the security certificate and change the different internet options and studied the SSL state but nothing worked. it will be so simple i never thought of it. thank you very much

Posted by: satyanad pandey at January 28, 2009 3:00 AM

THANK YOU. The invalid security certificate problem has plagued me for months. You solved the problem by telling me to correct the date. God bless you!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted by: bea at January 28, 2009 8:14 PM

I have had this error for one month, we have tried everything!! I called my internet provider who tried troubleshooting, they couldn't fix it. They referred me to Microsoft, who were no help, then wanted to charge me money... i said no thanks. I then decided to google and found this website, all I had to do was change the date and I was set. WOW! I would have been so upset if I paid Microsoft to tell me to change the date on my PC to fix this problem. You all are awesome! Thanks for alleviating so much stress from me!!!

Posted by: Laura at January 31, 2009 3:18 PM

I had the same problem with the expired certificate issue. Instead of getting upset right away I took a deep breath. Usually this is when I start a series of technical "Hell" days trying to resolve a problem.

Thank you so much for posting this solution. It literally saved me weeks/months of stress.

I would still like to know how the date got changed.
Many, Many, Many, Thanks, Karen.

Posted by: Special K at February 1, 2009 5:37 PM

Ingeneous!!! I was living way in the past! Like many of the other posters I was concerned my computer was being tapped into. Many thanks to the Sherlock sleuth and Dave for sharing on this website.

Posted by: TAJ at February 3, 2009 10:31 AM

I have WIndows XP, Sp2, IE6. I still get an invalid certificate after syncing time with server. Any ideas???

Posted by: Scott at February 4, 2009 9:00 AM

Bam! Thanks!

Posted by: Andy at February 10, 2009 5:34 PM

HAHAHAHA...Gosh!...I even rebooted Windows Vista...such a simple solution! HAHAHA...as a future computer technician...I will remeber this forever!

Posted by: Enrique at February 15, 2009 5:39 AM

Are you serious, the date? That fixed it.
Thx a million Dave.

Posted by: Linda at February 16, 2009 9:40 AM

Thanks for the help

Posted by: Justice at February 18, 2009 5:50 PM

Dave: Thank you for sharing this solution with us. I am glad I found your site, as this was a real time problem for me. I missed a chance on an auction, but won't miss the next one.
Regards, ~Dick~

Posted by: Dick LaMonte at February 19, 2009 3:52 PM

Dave: Thank you for sharing this solution with us. I am glad I found your site, as this was a real time problem for me. I missed a chance on an auction, but won't miss the next one.
Regards, ~Dick~

Posted by: Dick LaMonte at February 19, 2009 3:52 PM

Hey Dave, I wish I could be thanking you right now, but unfortunatly I can not! I read through your solutions and I have tried everything so far but everytime I log into my email, it brings up the "this websites security certificate has been revoked" error. I am going crazy because my email is my lifeline! I know you will be able to help me.
Thanks!

Posted by: Kayleen at March 4, 2009 5:43 PM

everytime i click on something to open it freezes . then the internet explorer has to close.

when it does it says something about add ons . i have no i deal how to fix this. can you help me?
when my computer freezes i have to shut it off on the bottom thats the only way it will shut off. thank you arlene

Posted by: arlene at March 8, 2009 9:33 AM

Thanks I cant believe it that is all it was the date. My wife is an I.T tech and she never ran into the problem before and now i can tell her i fixed it lol. Thanks for all your help.

Posted by: Scott at March 10, 2009 9:53 AM

This was the problem! Thanks!

Posted by: Erich at March 21, 2009 10:47 AM

Lol , Same here. I’m pretty god at fixing computers and I tweaked IE several times to try and get the “security certificate warning “ to go away. Nothing worked! Finally one site said that if your running IE 7 you’ll need to go into tools (top button on IE page)\internet options\advanced (over on the upper right side of the box) once in “advanced� scroll down and check your security boxes.

Anyway that wasn’t my problem either and I thought I had a virus. I was just about to reload MS Windows and then I found this page. My clock was off too. My date was off by 5 Years after I reset c-mos. Thanks You Guys So Much. You certainly have saved me a good deal of what would have been wasted time. Hail Dave!

Posted by: Kirkoe at March 25, 2009 9:39 AM

Dave, thanks so much. So glad I found this site, I was going crazy!
Alli

Posted by: Alli at April 9, 2009 9:55 PM

Finally. This was driving me nuts. I too thought it was a virus. My date was set 2 months in advance somehow. Now problem is solved. I'm gonna bookmark you Dave. Thanks

Posted by: Clisty at April 12, 2009 7:29 PM

holy moly!!!!! i was 15 hours crazy in fixing this problem!!!!! and then i finally found this website!! thanks a lot!!!! I thought there was something wrong the settings of my connection,
ther is another problem in my pc, I CAN'T UPDATE MY TIME USING INTERNET, WHAT THE F#&K!!!! IT WAS DIPLAYED "THE RPC SERVER IS UNAVAILABLE" CAN YOU HELLP ME GUYS?

thanks a lot!!!!!!!


thanks brad dave taylor,
Gio of Cavite, Philippines

Posted by: gio at April 15, 2009 1:34 AM

This happen to me after having start up issue with one of my pc I change the internal battery adjusted clock did not think to look at date. issue resolved after doing search on this issue.

Posted by: Emery Freeman at April 26, 2009 7:30 PM

OMG
I can not believe that this fixed the stupid problem that has driven Me wild everyday for 2 months....YaY... 30 microsoft updates for Me now.it was preventing them from loading...Thank You so much for sharing..Kathy

Posted by: Kathy at May 2, 2009 4:12 AM

I reinstalled everything on my laptop... and this Certificate issue was bothering me too much... but finally worked fine... by just changing the system date... because it was last year's date... dammm....
Thanks everyone for ur kind reviews...

Posted by: Henny at May 3, 2009 8:43 PM

wow1 u guys are great.simple solution to an irritating problem.thank you

Posted by: michael at May 8, 2009 5:24 AM

My system date is fine but still I get this warning "The site's security certificate has expired!" & that too only for Gmail & other related sites. Any pointers to resolve this issue would be highly appreciated.

Posted by: Bob at May 20, 2009 3:21 AM

Thankyou sooo much ,my computer savvy husband has been working on my computer trying to fix this problem all day.Then i google find you and wa la
i am a genius because of you,I must have accidently set the date wrong yesterday when checking a date and had it on the wrong month.Now its fine
thankyou

Posted by: juLLIE Dodds at May 21, 2009 6:28 AM

You're a life saver. I called the technical support guys at the company that I have the internet with and they told me to contact the administrators of the websites that I was trying to log in. Needless to say I typed my question on googled and there you were and the solution so simple. Indeed I had set the date three months in advance and thanks to you it's all working fine now.
Dave thank you very very much. I was literally pulling my hair out.

Posted by: Vivian at May 21, 2009 9:00 AM

Not only did you just solved my problem, you have added two days onto my life!

I thought it was the 23rd because of this computer, and it's only the 21st, oh the chaos it has caused thus far...

Thankyou!

Posted by: Sarah at May 21, 2009 10:08 AM

Placed a certificate on a server - and now we are unable to log into it. What can we do to fix this problem?

Posted by: Judy Skelton at May 26, 2009 11:25 AM

hello.... its me sweety there is a problem in security certificate please i have to solve my my please help me

Posted by: sweety at May 26, 2009 11:44 PM

Dave,
Your buddy with the security certificate problem who figured out his computer date was wrong is a genius!! I had the same problem (though mine was a year in the future) and now, having changed it back, everything works very well. Many thanks to you both!

Steve

Posted by: Steve Fish at May 27, 2009 9:58 AM

i have the same problem having trouble or security certificate has expired or is not yet valid everytime i open my yahoo mail acct.

Posted by: Arnaldo at May 29, 2009 6:46 PM

im having the same problem about certificate error evrytime i open my email acct. how can i fix it

Posted by: Arnaldo at June 1, 2009 8:30 PM

Im having issues when login to msn,expired security keep appearin.i need help

Posted by: Jojo at June 3, 2009 7:25 PM

I was mad at IE8 because it was so secure, it wouldn't let me go to the bank or check my email. Come to find out, it was set to 2002! Who'd a thunk it?

Posted by: David at June 4, 2009 4:03 PM

i am using internet explorer7.....and when i am opening orkut site it is giving me that.... There is a problem with this website's security certificate.
We recommend that you close this webpage and do not continue to this website.
Click here to close this webpage.
Continue to this website (not recommended
when i am cliking on continue to this website its coming but not a complete data..........and site is getting stuck........
please help me out soon.....
i wil b thankful to you dave

Posted by: hajira at June 5, 2009 11:24 PM

thank u dave thank u so much..............i read dis page and i corrected my date n time
and prob is solved now thank god........
i did so many efforts from so many time....
thank u

Posted by: hajira at June 5, 2009 11:27 PM

Thank you so much for posting this solution. I was so puzzled to find I couldn't get to gmail this morning from this laptop, yet I could from the MAC and the PC. Thank goodness I found this, as the date was set to Sept 17 2008 and when I changed it today and set the time to Microsoft sync, the problem was solved.

What really puzzles me now is how the date and time got changed on the computer! Hmmm...is that elementary?

Posted by: Sha at June 7, 2009 5:43 PM

Thank you so much for this. I was bugged for a long time IE when it kept asking for a security certificate on trustworthy sites. I then realized that my computers date and time were off from this post and now the problem is fixed!

Posted by: Thomas Szeluga at June 9, 2009 4:40 PM

I HAVE SECURITY CERTIFICATE FOR THIS SITE HAS BEEN
REVOKED. THIS SITE SHOULD NOT BE TRUSTED.OK
THIS IS ON MY COMPUTER.IF I DO NOTE CLUCK ON OK.
THE COMPUTER WILL NOT WORK.

Posted by: Ralph Bailey at June 23, 2009 1:41 PM

I had a network configuration that required a cert on the website (in IIS) on the server (a win 2003 box), AND on the firewall. This was specifically for the situation of the website functioning perfectly inside the firewall and not working outside the firewall. In fact, after a cert update, internal was perfect, but people outside kept seeing the old cert. But this page was useful nonetheless. Thanks everyone.

Posted by: FriendlyFellow at June 23, 2009 6:56 PM

I had the error when I tried to access 3 new web sites for the first time.

I checked my date settings on my computer and found them to be correct.

I went back again and tried to access the sites in new tabs and the sites worked correctly.

Perhaps the server's time was incorrect and it reset the time on first access. Who knows, but now all three sites work and they did not on the first attempt at accessing them.

Posted by: Jim at July 11, 2009 5:02 AM

Thankyou from a friend,..... was getting house ready for sale, moved computer. trying to pay bills, leave for vacation. spent hour with this. (that i didnt have) not to mention the annoyance of a problem you cant fix and cant leave. I usually just reformat, guaranteed to fix any problem in less time in most cases, thankyou microsoft for the migrain headaches.
thankyou Dave for making everything right in my world again!

Posted by: stevo at July 24, 2009 10:14 PM

Well for crying out loud! I just installed new OS a few days ago and could not check my email. It was mindboggling..Then found your forum and checked date. Now I KNOW there's gremlins! Year read July 2025!.. After changing I found it a little hard to believe but my email was back to normal! Thank you, thank you, thank you!..Rob T

Posted by: Rob Tolby at July 27, 2009 2:04 AM

wow ! two days of going nuts! had my computer guy come over last night to try and fix it ! install ,uninstall,run this and that checking for the problem! woke up this morning and typed in security certifacate error in my search box! found this site.checked date and time.was off ,said aug/2008 changed it and all was fixed in less then 10 seconds !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! man i hate computers!!!!! thanks to the genius !!!

Posted by: douglas at August 6, 2009 4:43 AM

hi...friend...

im from phils..its been a long time since i havent able to log in in anywhere becoz of invalid security certificate.....i search on net and i found your site,thank you so much..i reset the date and now i can log in...keep up the goodwork...

Posted by: kates tan at August 15, 2009 10:17 AM

Thanks for the info Dave. Wow! I was beginning to worry that my computer had a virus or was hacked when I tried to login to my e-mail accounts and pay some bills. Luckily, I came across this page. And to my surprise my clock on my taskbar was set to 2008. Once I reset it to 2009 no more problems! Thanks!

Posted by: Ryan at August 23, 2009 5:04 AM

Thank goodness for your website. These security certificate notices have been popping up recently.
Tried checking it on my computer and finally decided to do a search online. Took around 10 seconds to find the answer! I couldn't believe that somehow my date was 2 years in the past! THANK YOU!

Posted by: Sandi at August 30, 2009 9:48 PM

oh my gosh i stumbled on this website by accident. It was the best thing in my life(almost) I was ready to throw my computer out the window. Nobody I knew ever heard about certificate errors!!!! I changed time and date and whala!!!! I think I'll go put my feet up and have a glass of something.

Posted by: nancy at September 2, 2009 4:27 PM

Brilliant! Thanks for the answer Dave, however my problem has a little twist. My date and time changes every time I turn off my pc, which results in the same security certificate issues. Please help!!!!

Posted by: Stuart at September 3, 2009 2:52 PM

Stuart, that's a classic example of having a dead battery on your motherboard. There's a tiny watchbattery that's used to retain date/time information on reboot or power down: if it dies, your computer is clueless on boot. Pop open your computer, find it, and replace it. Carefully.

Posted by: Dave Taylor at September 3, 2009 3:11 PM

Sir Ji My date and time changes every time I turn off my pc, which results in the same security certificate issues. Please help!!!!

Posted by: kaushal at September 5, 2009 8:24 AM

LOL! I was having the very same problem with my mother's laptop and my first thoughts were the same as Dave's- I changed my browser security settings, downloaded Firefox and got the same results, ran my virus scanner. Then I searched the web and read this, mom's computer was set to a date over 6 Years ago! Thank you for posting this, I don't if I ever would have thought to check the date!

Posted by: Mandy Bayles at September 7, 2009 3:51 PM

Just wanted to thank you so much for the info. I thought I had a virus or worse and it was just as you mentioned above the date was set at Jan. 2004 instead of Sept. 2009. Again, THANK YOU!

Posted by: Dami at September 22, 2009 3:58 AM

i cant access my google mail account and have tried everything suggested on the site, i still get the message.....websites security certificate what else is there to try...... its driving me nuts

Posted by: dave whitehead at September 28, 2009 9:43 AM

Just worked. :)

Posted by: Alex at October 8, 2009 5:28 AM

I found the same problem with my computer, however I fixed it earlier today and just tried to log on to Netflix and it still did it?!

Posted by: Joe at October 19, 2009 8:36 PM

Dear Sir,

i updated the security certificate and also update time but is showing error. Please give me desired solution

Posted by: Pintu Gupta at October 22, 2009 5:38 AM

Sir,

My date and time changes every time I turn off my pc, which results in the same security certificate issues. Please help!!!!

Posted by: Pintu Gupta at October 22, 2009 5:41 AM

If you open up your computer, you'll see that there's a small watch battery on the circuit board. That's the date backup and if you're finding that you keep having the date and time reset, it's dead and you need to replace it.

Posted by: Dave Taylor at October 23, 2009 12:04 AM

Hey, it worked. All I did was change the date. Thank you so much. My sanity was at risk.

Posted by: Ann at October 27, 2009 10:26 AM

Thanks for the info on date and time. My computer time was Jan. 2004 and in October, 2009 aol.com was blocked until I changed the time close to the above date. Thanks a million, you saved me lots of time if not money. Lee

Posted by: Lee Like at October 29, 2009 2:02 PM

Hey All

Thanks for the heads up on the date and time - worked perfectly.

Just want to add, MSN and GMail checker also do the same thing - check for valid security certificates when the log in or check for mail. Im sure other programs do the same thing. If you get an error code from MSN or anything else regarding invalid security certificates check your date and time. Mine changed iteslf after i may have overclocked a little too much, had to fix the BIOS and set the month & date wrong.

Thanks again! :)

Posted by: Overlord (Damo) at November 2, 2009 9:59 PM

I have a lot to say, but ...
Starbucks coffee cup I have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but most of all I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a chai!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!











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