Every time I want to use Adobe Acrobat, I have to turn off the smart firewall. Adobe authentication is complex using multiple utility applications. Thus although Acrobat has a rule for access to the Internet, the authentication process is silently blocked (since the recent updates, Smart Firewall has been asking to allow access for other programs and at annoying frequency, but it does NOT do so for the Acrobat authentication). Curiously, the Adobe Creative Cloud authentication works flawlessly.
Does anyone know what rules should be implemented to fix this problem?
Adobe lists some 50 servers that need to be added for its programs to authenticate.
Before anyone asks, yes I have uninstalled and reinstalled Acrobat with the hope that Smart Firewall would detect the authentication process as new and ask to allow access to the Internet.
Title says Acrobat Pro DC
Solution Replicate (multiple) program rules
There were multiple program control rules for some of the Adobe Acrobat applications: “Adobe Acrobat”, “Adobe AcroCEF”, and “Adobe Crash Processor”. Delete and recreate.
TLDR
I finally discovered the root cause of the problem. For some reason Smart Firewall created numerous duplicate rules for different components of the Acrobat installation (possibly during Acrobat updates?). Replicate rules existed for “Adobe Acrobat”, “Adobe AcroCEF”, and “Adobe Crash Processor”.
The duplicate rules (some had 6 or more) seem to have confused the firewall, and prevented the rule from being executed. (Not sure why since most firewalls, including Norton for traffic rules act on the first rule encountered.)
Removing the duplicate rules was a mission. For each entry it is a two-step process, first click remove app, then wait for a sub-window and click remove app a second time. The first remove app sporadically did not open the sub-window, and at other times opened two sub-windows. It was not possible to remove only one of the remaining two entries. This strongly suggests the rules were conflated, i.e., they were tied together and that would explain non-functionality (not first rule encountered and done).
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