68 lines
3.1 KiB
Plaintext
68 lines
3.1 KiB
Plaintext
 
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---
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title: Why is my site getting a 403 error?
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description: A 403 Forbidden on cPanel hosting is almost always file permissions or file ownership. Here's how to check and fix both.
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sidebar:
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order: 3
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---
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import { Steps, Aside } from '@astrojs/starlight/components';
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import Support from '~/content/partials/support-link.mdx';
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A **403 Forbidden** means the web server found your file but refused to serve it. On our cPanel servers that's nearly always one of two things: permissions that are wrong, or files owned by the wrong user.
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We run **suEXEC**, which makes your site's code run as *your* account rather than a shared web-server user. That's a security benefit — one account can't read another's files — but it does mean the server is strict about ownership and permissions.
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## The correct values
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| Item | Permissions |
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| --- | --- |
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| Folders | `755` |
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| Files | `644` |
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Anything **more permissive** (a folder at `777`, a file at `666`) is refused by suEXEC. This surprises people, because loosening permissions is the instinctive fix for a permissions error — here it makes things worse, and it's a genuine security risk.
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## Fixing it in cPanel
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The File Manager handles this without needing a terminal:
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<Steps>
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1. Sign in to cPanel and open **File Manager**.
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2. Navigate to the site's folder. For your primary domain that's normally `public_html`.
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3. Select the folder or file, then click **Permissions** in the toolbar.
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4. Set folders to `755` and files to `644`. To apply to everything beneath a folder at once, tick the **recurse into subdirectories** option and choose whether it applies to files or folders — you'll need one pass for each, since they take different values.
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</Steps>
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## When ownership is the problem
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Permissions are only half of it. Files also have to be owned by your account.
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- **Uploaded over FTP or SFTP?** Ownership is almost certainly fine — the files were created as you.
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- **Pulled the site down over SSH** with `git clone`, `wget`, `curl`, or unpacked an archive as another user? Ownership may be wrong, and no amount of `chmod` will fix that. The files need `chown` back to your account.
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If you suspect ownership, [open a ticket](https://secure.anhonesthost.com/submitticket.php) — it's a one-command fix from our side and safer than guessing.
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<Aside type="caution">
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Be careful with recursive commands over SSH. A `chmod -R 777` or a `chown` aimed at the wrong path can break your whole account, and in the case of `777` will leave the site returning 403 anyway. If you aren't confident, ask us.
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</Aside>
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## If permissions and ownership are both correct
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Other causes of a 403:
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- **No index file.** A folder with no `index.html` or `index.php`, on a server with directory listing disabled, returns 403.
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- **An `.htaccess` rule** denying access — either one you added, or one a security plugin wrote.
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- **A security plugin or firewall** blocking your IP after failed logins. Try from a different network or your phone on mobile data; if that works, it's an IP block.
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## Related
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- [Get your free SSL certificate](/cpanel/free-ssl-certificate/)
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## Still stuck?
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<Support />
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