Website is down ("403 Forbidden" error)

One of the most common causes of the 403 Forbidden error are incorrect file permissions settings. This error message is displayed to protect you against hackers, i.e. for security reasons.

To correct this error, check if any file's or folder's permission is set to 777 (which means that everybody can edit it). If you detect a file or a folder with those settings, change the value 777 to 750 or 755 (for folders) and to 644 (for files).

Maybe the obstacle that prevents you from accessing a certain website is the great amount of cookies and cache files stored in your device.

To learn how to clear the browser's cache (and cookies), check out the don't know how to clear the cache solutions.

It's possible that the browser itself prevents you from browsing the net and loading websites. A simple restart of the browser program itself could solve the problem.

To restart the browser click the X icon in the top-right corner of the browser (or in the top-left on Mac OS), and click the browser icon from the desktop. Try loading the same website again.

If you (or the website administrator) recently updated the DNS settings of the website or registered a new domain, please note that it can take up to 48 hours for these changes to take effect, so, the website may appear that it's down during this time.

Note: If 48 hours have passed and nothing changed (i.e. your website is still down), contact the hosting-server operators.

Maybe you can't access the website because of a spelling error.

Check if you entered the website's name correctly, and if you entered the right top-level domains (.com, .net, .org etc.).

Maybe the website is down because of an ISP- or hosting-related issue. Try again in 10-30 minutes to check if it's back online. If it's still offline, report the issue to the hosting provider which will resolve it quickly.

If you have already verified that all the file permissions are correct and you still see the 403 Forbidden error, you will need to check your .htaccess file. You can have multiple .htaccess files in your account, so you may need to search or modify .htaccess files other than public_html/.htaccess.

For example, if you have an addon domain located at public_html/addon_domain, you'll need to check any .htaccess files within that folder as well. If one of the lines in the actual file says Options All -Indexes then simply remove -Indexes and save the file.

Note: This solution also helps if the "504 Gateway Timeout" error and "500 Internal Server Error" are displayed.

Reloading the website may fix it, especially if you see a 408 Request Timeout error (or 40X error of any type). Reload it by pressing CTRL + R or clicking the semi-circular arrow next to the URL.

If your website is hosted by Just host and you experience issues you couldn't resolve by yourself, contact their support staff, who will help you resolve the issue and they are available 24/7 for you.

Contact them on: 888-755-7585, or via their live chat service.

There might be an issue with the server and/or the hosting provider of the website, or your IP address might have been blocked by them for some reason.

Contact them and inform them about the issue. They will tell you what's wrong and resolve it as soon as possible.