WCF Service - authentication / SSPI error

Question

When I run my WCF service on my local machine, it works fine. When I deploy the same files to our test server, I get this error when my test client tries to connect to the WCF service:

Security Support Provider Interface (SSPI) authentication failed. The server may not be running in an account with identity 'host/Server01'. If the server is running in a service account (Network Service for example), specify the account's ServicePrincipalName as the identity in the EndpointAddress for the server. If the server is running in a user account, specify the account's UserPrincipalName as the identity in the EndpointAddress for the server.

What does this mean and what area should I be looking to fix? I played around with the web.config identity section, but I'm still unsure what is needed.

Answer 1

I got a similar error before but the message is somewhat different

Right click on the application pool the web site is running under, click on Property then go to the Identity tab. Try to put the "host/Server01" identity in and see if that helps.

Answer 2

This error can also happen for Microsoft Dynamics GP Web Services. In our case, it turns out that the person who set up the GP Web Services used his personal user account as the service account. When he changed his password, it broke the web services.

So, check your user identity and password if your web service used to work but no longer works.