Intermittent 401 auth failures across multiple workflows since yesterday

[sven-bo]

Your Task History ID

IjU3NjUwNTYoMDYzMDAoMzU1MjZiNTUzMDUxMzY1MTYyNTQzODBmMzEi_pc

Consent to Access & Modify

I authorize Pabbly Support to log in to my account and make changes to the specified workflow for troubleshooting.

Since yesterday, multiple workflows are failing intermittently with 401 Unauthorized errors. This is affecting customer-facing product delivery workflows, meaning paying customers are not receiving their products when these failures occur.

Before anyone suggests it: NO, this is not an API key issue. The credentials are correct. I know this because the exact same steps succeed when re-run manually without changing anything. The problem is clearly on Pabbly's side, intermittently failing to pass authentication headers during automated execution.

Do NOT re-execute any of these tasks. They have already been resolved manually. The issue I need addressed is WHY this is happening in the first place, so it stops happening going forward.

Affected Task History IDs:

1. IjU3NjUwNTYoMDYzMDAoMzU1MjZiNTUzMDUxMzY1MTYyNTQzODBmMzEi_pc
Step: Get transaction details > Execute API Request
Error: "Access denied. Invalid or missing API key." (code 401)

2. IjU3NjUwNTYoMDYzMDAoMzU1MjZiNTUzMDUxMzI1MTZiNTQzODBmMzki_pc
Step: Extract the IP Address > Extract Pattern
Error: "Required field Text missing" (downstream failure caused by auth step failing)

3. IjU3NjUwNTYoMDYzMDAoMzU1MjZmNTUzYzUxMzE1MTYxNTQzNjBmMzki_pc
Step: Get transaction details > Execute API Request
Error: "Access denied. Invalid or missing API key." (code 401)

4. IjU3NjUwNTYoMDYzMDAoMzU1MjZlNTUzMzUxMzE1MTY3NTQzODBmMzIi_pc
Step: Get transaction details > Execute API Request
Error: "Access denied. Invalid or missing API key." (code 401)

5. IjU3NjUwNTYoMDYzMDAoMzU1MjZlNTUzNzUxMzI1MTYwNTQzNzBmMzki_pc
Step: Set license to "Expired" in database > Execute API Request
Error: "Valid X-API-Key is required." (code 401)

All of these worked fine before yesterday. All use "No Auth Connection." All fail on automated runs but succeed on manual re-runs.

I need an actual investigation into what changed on Pabbly's infrastructure, not a suggestion to "check my API keys" or "try re-running."

 

[Preeti Paryani]

Hi @sven-bo,

Thank you for reaching out and sharing the details.

Upon checking, we were unable to access the executions using the provided Task History IDs, as they appear to be invalid on our end. Due to this, we were not able to review those specific tasks.

Could you please share the workflow URL(s) associated with these executions so we can investigate the issue further from our side?

In the meantime, we recommend setting the Auto Re-execution attempts to 2 for these workflows and monitoring the executions to help mitigate intermittent failures.

Once we have the workflow details, we will be able to examine the configuration and assist you further.

 

[sven-bo]

Please see the screenshots below.
Regarding: "In the meantime, we recommend setting the Auto Re-execution attempts to 2 for these workflows and monitoring the executions to help mitigate intermittent failures."

See my inital post: "All of these worked fine before yesterday. All use "No Auth Connection." All fail on automated runs but succeed on manual re-runs. I need an actual investigation into what changed on Pabbly's infrastructure, not a suggestion to "check my API keys" or "try re-running."

 

[Preeti Paryani]

Hi @sven-bo,

Thank you for highlighting this and for sharing the screenshots.

Could you please share the workflow URL(s) associated with these executions so we can review the workflow configuration and investigate the issue further from our end?

Once we have the workflow details, we will look into it and assist you accordingly.

 

[sven-bo]

Pabbly

connect.pabbly.com

Pabbly

connect.pabbly.com

Pabbly

connect.pabbly.com

Pabbly

connect.pabbly.com

Pabbly

connect.pabbly.com

Pabbly

connect.pabbly.com

 

[Preeti Paryani]

Hey @sven-bo,

Thanks for the details. We have escalated this issue to our team for further review. Please allow us some time and we will be back with an update shortly.

 

[sven-bo]

I'm just guessing here, but perhaps the internal variables are not working. I'm using variables for the API keys, and if those are wrong, a 401 will be triggered. Look at this thread too, someone else mentioned the same issue with variables not working: https://forum.pabbly.com/threads/variables-not-working-need-some-help.35247/

This is really frustrating for me right now. Every time a customer makes a purchase, my workflow fails and the product isn't immediately registered in my database. This causes a ton of unnecessary support tickets on my end. Please fix this as soon as possible.

 

[ArshilAhmad]

I'm just guessing here, but perhaps the internal variables are not working. I'm using variables for the API keys, and if those are wrong, a 401 will be triggered. Look at this thread too, someone else mentioned the same issue with variables not working: https://forum.pabbly.com/threads/variables-not-working-need-some-help.35247/

This is really frustrating for me right now. Every time a customer makes a purchase, my workflow fails and the product isn't immediately registered in my database. This causes a ton of unnecessary support tickets on my end. Please fix this as soon as possible.

Our team is working on fixing this issue. We will get back to you as soon as it is fixed.

Thanks & Regards,
Arshil Ahmad
Customer Support Associate
Pabbly.com
Rate your support

 

[sven-bo]

Update: I added logging on my API side, and I can now confirm the root cause. Pabbly is sending the variable placeholder literally instead of resolving it. Here's what my API logs show:

Unauthorized API access attempt | provided_key={{InternalAPIKey}}

So the variable {{InternalAPIKey}} is not being resolved to its actual value during automated execution. I'm guessing it's not just this one, but all user-defined variables that are affected.