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When I try to connect to public WiFi networks that have a pop-up window to finish connecting, a notice comes down saying “A problem occurred. The webpage could not be loaded” and I am unable to fully connect.

Are there any tips on how to authenticate to a WiFi network when the authentication/authorization page won't load like that?

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  • I am sorry to bring you such a deceptive answer: you can’t do anything with such a silly error message. There are many way for an access control to fail. The problem should be fixed by the network admins who set up this access control. But they won’t be helped by such a silly error message. The best action you might start is to report to the admins of the Wi-Fi network “an authentication failure with a stupid MacOS error message”. And if you are full of hope and good will, you might report to Apple their “useless error message about an error which occured” 😉. – dan Dec 5 '18 at 8:06
  • See apple.stackexchange.com/questions/329163/… – rogerdpack Feb 12 '19 at 15:25
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Since you have a pop up, it’s almost certain the WiFi link is connecting and you are dealing with the networking side / captive portal.

One thing that sometimes helps is opening a web browser and going to http://captive.apple.com or just any web page.

Typically the security / registration / portal then lets you answer whatever questions / accept any EULA and then give you a proper IP address / DNS server / connection to the internet.

Past that, you’ll need to look at DHCP response or contact the person that supports that network to check their side.

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    You’re right the Wi-Fi connection is on. This is a captive portal most probably configured with an outdated certificate or one which can’t be verified on the Mac side since the traffic is not yet fully opened. The problem is 2 sided: 1. the MacOS error message is useless, even for a network engineer, 2. there is an error configuration in the captive portal, but the silly error message won’t help them even with the best will 😉. – dan Dec 5 '18 at 7:55

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