Hi Johny,

The issue has been resolved, and you should now be able to access the time zone 
data.
Apologies for the error.

Thanks,
James Mitchell
IANA

From: James Mitchell via tz <[email protected]>
Reply-To: James Mitchell <[email protected]>
Date: Tuesday, February 3, 2026 at 4:28 PM
To: Johny Jose <[email protected]>, "[email protected]" <[email protected]>
Subject: [tz] Re: Downloads from data.iana.org now seem to be sensitive to the 
User-Agent value supplied in HTTP request headers

Hi Johny,

I’m sorry you are having issues downloading the tz data.
There should have been no changes to access restrictions via user agent or 
other attributes. I’ll investigate this and get back to you.

Thanks,
James Mitchell
IANA

From: Johny Jose via tz <[email protected]>
Reply-To: Johny Jose <[email protected]>
Date: Tuesday, February 3, 2026 at 4:20 PM
To: "[email protected]" <[email protected]>
Subject: [tz] Downloads from data.iana.org now seem to be sensitive to the 
User-Agent value supplied in HTTP request headers

Hi,

I am reaching out regarding an issue encountered while attempting to download 
the latest tzdata release (tzdata2025c.tar.gz) from 
https://data.iana.org/time-zones/releases/tzdata2025c.tar.gz using Java JDK 8’s 
HTTP request API. We use the tzupdater tool 
(https://www.oracle.com/java/technologies/javase/tzupdater-readme.html 
[oracle.com]<https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/www.oracle.com/java/technologies/javase/tzupdater-readme.html__;!!PtGJab4!8sjeyoLpOKYfMBylNwZ82tXVISzj4w-hs2seOpeMtUE38c5IFvC5_FUKUaTo7vJS8qabKX7eNaWH0PAQTA$>)
 to update the jdk to latest tzdata. Since Monday, January 26, 2026, we have 
been facing issues while downloading tzdata2025c.tar.gz.
We are receiving an HTTP 403 error response from the server. This appears to be 
due to a validation failure related to the HTTP header User-Agent 
(specifically, User-Agent: Java/1.8.0_471). User-Agent values from JDK 11 and 
later (e.g. User-Agent: Java/11.0.16) do not trigger this issue.

Could you kindly advise on the following:
Has there been a specific format restriction enabled for the User-Agent value 
string to grant access?
If so, is it possible to whitelist widely used Java-based User-Agent strings?

Error Logs:
sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection sendCONNECTRequest
FINE: 
sun.net.www.MessageHeader@2f1129655<mailto:sun.net.www.MessageHeader@2f1129655> 
pairs: {CONNECT data.iana.org:443 HTTP/1.1: null}{User-Agent: 
Java/1.8.0_471}{Host: data.iana.org}{Accept: text/html, image/gif, image/jpeg, 
*; q=.2, */*; q=.2}{Proxy-Connection: keep-alive}
Jan 30, 2026 8:07:24 AM sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection doTunneling
FINE: 
sun.net.www.MessageHeader@d4342c21<mailto:sun.net.www.MessageHeader@d4342c21> 
pairs: {null: HTTP/1.0 200 Connection Established}
Jan 30, 2026 8:07:24 AM sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection 
writeRequests
FINE: 
sun.net.www.MessageHeader@770d33265<mailto:sun.net.www.MessageHeader@770d33265> 
pairs: {GET /time-zones/releases/tzdata2025c.tar.gz HTTP/1.1: null}{User-Agent: 
Java/1.8.0_471}{Host: data.iana.org}{Accept: text/html, image/gif, image/jpeg, 
*; q=.2, */*; q=.2}{Connection: keep-alive}
Jan 30, 2026 8:07:24 AM sun.net.www.http.HttpClient logFinest
FINEST: KeepAlive stream used: 
https://data.iana.org/time-zones/releases/tzdata2025c.tar.gz
Jan 30, 2026 8:07:24 AM sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection 
getInputStream0
FINE: 
sun.net.www.MessageHeader@d4342c211<mailto:sun.net.www.MessageHeader@d4342c211> 
pairs: {null: HTTP/1.1 403 Forbidden}{Date: Fri, 30 Jan 2026 08:07:24 
GMT}{Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8}{Content-Length: 16}{Connection: 
keep-alive}{Cache-Control: private, max-age=0, no-store, no-cache, 
must-revalidate, post-check=0, pre-check=0}{Expires: Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:01 
GMT}{Referrer-Policy: same-origin}{X-Frame-Options: SAMEORIGIN}{Server: 
cloudflare}
java.io.IOException: Server returned HTTP response code: 403 for URL: 
https://data.iana.org/time-zones/releases/tzdata2025c.tar.gz

I tried to create a new thread in tz - 
lists.iana.org<https://lists.iana.org/hyperkitty/list/[email protected]/> but could 
not succeed in it.
Thank you for your assistance. Let me know if you would like any further 
information.

Thanks,
Johny


Confidential- Oracle Internal

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