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I've done 

ping mysiteaddress.com

But I get

PING mysiteaddress.com (xx.xx.xx.xxx) 56(84) bytes of data.
--- mysiteaddress.com ping statistics ---
   29 packets transmitted, 0 received, 100% packet loss, time 27999ms

I have tried pinging the site repeatedly and I get the same result however my site has been up and running all the while and accessible on my browser even when I clear my browser's cache. What can be the cause of this?

Both the server and the local machine are running on Ubuntu 12.04

Mutuma
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    ICMP and TCP-port-80 are completely different services a server can offer. You might as well complain that although the road outside your house has been torn up, people are still able to arrive via the footpath across the field to the back gate, and you don't understand how. – MadHatter Sep 24 '14 at 09:22
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    I honestly would love to make a law that every person setting up a web server for the first time these days has to get a tattoo on them that reads "The only thing that ping *truly* tests is whether or not ping is working" – Rob Moir Sep 24 '14 at 09:27

2 Answers2

3

Your site doesn't respond to ping requests. No law requires it to.

CAUTION: This may be because some idiot blocked all ICMP because they once heard that "ICMP is a security problem". You should make sure essential ICMP messages are not blocked or TCP's path MTU discovery can break.

David Schwartz
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Most likely ICMP traffic is blocked by a firewall. Check your iptables settings to see if the site is the one doing the blocking (thus being under your control)

iptables -L -n

if not, it means a firewall between you and the machine is doing the blocking (and is out of your control).

thanasisk
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  • I guess this must be the reason since I am hosted on Azure and there is usually a firewall blocking connections to the server unless explicitly declared in an endpoint – Mutuma Sep 24 '14 at 09:29