Note: This page was originally sourced from our Blogger page: http://ncarrda.blogspot.com/2015/11/what-to-do-if-you-experience-401-not.html

Recently a number of RDA users have reported experiencing a "403:  Forbidden" error when attempting to download files with scripts.

If you are experiencing this error, please remove the associated cookie file that you are using to support the script, typically named "auth.rda_ucar_edu", and rerun the script with your RDA username and password to authenticate and download a new cookie.

If you are unable to download a new cookie, please go to the RDA web interface at http://rda.ucar.edu, sign out of your session, then sign back in with the same RDA username and password to verify that you are using the correct authentication information.  If you continue to experience a 403 error at this point, please contact rdahelp for assistance.