Why is LinkedIn API returning "999: request failed" message?

Question

I have been using the LinkedIn API without trouble for a while and suddenly today calls that used to work started failing. The API returns an HTML page titled "999: request failed". The body of the page says "Sorry, we are unable to serve your request at this time due to unusual traffic from your network connection."

What does LinkedIn mean by "unusual activity"?

Has LinkedIn implemented limits to the number of calls my application can make in a day? If so, what are they?

Or, are they stopping calls from the IP address of my application's VPC? Is there a way to determine the reason?

Answer 1

Had the same issues, Allowing Third-party cookies solved it for me

Answer 2

This happened when I was working with Python Selenium.

I cleared the browser's linkedin site data.

It worked after that.

Hope this helps!

Answer 3

I get this only when I'm at work and I suspect it's related to me using different VPNs that are hosted in different countries. After a while they eventually go away. From LinkedIn's perspective it looks like multiple logins are happening from all these countries and it's impossible for me to be in Spain one minute and Sweden the next and then back in Spain again.

Answer 4

By any change are the failures intermittent, and only started a few days ago?

I've been suffering from the same problem, on two different linkedin apps, on two different servers, over the past 2 days, intermittent failures both to do an oAuth connect, and to make API calls. I posted a similar topic myself: Intermittently receiving 999 Request Denied from the LinkedIn API. What does reason code 1,2,1 refer to Given its intermittent and happens on two apps on two servers, since two days ago, I cannot believe its an IP block for unusual activity. My own usage was very very low.

Someone kindly got in touch with me via twitter, who had the same problems also intermittent, and for the past couple of days (and also, on Linode which is where mine are hosted). They suggested that the problem is down to connecting over IPv6, and that since disabling IPv6 in connections to LinkedIn it has resolved for them.

As I'm using standard open source libraries to do the oAuth and sharing, I've had to disable IPv6 at a server level for now, and things seem to be working. I used this approach to disable IPv6 - https://askubuntu.com/questions/440649/how-to-disable-ipv6-in-ubuntu-14-04. This obviously isn't a long term solution. I'm hoping that someone from LinkedIn will reply to this and it will turn out to be an issue with their services blocking things incorrectly.

LinkedIn API integration is working again for me now, for now at least. However I'm still hoping for some resolution from a member of LinkedIn staff.

For background, after spotting the failures I was able to get the "unusual activity" message from the body as you have found. This also contained a link to an unblock form, though with no references to what the block was in relation to. I completed this, and highlighted the problem, and also pointed out that there had been reports on here of Google Compute Engine being accidentally blocked a couple of weeks ago (which was replied to by LinkedIn staff confirming it was a mistake - Linkedin is doing a google cloud / App Engine block)) and wondering if this was a similar problem - my servers are with Linode, and so possibly they were blocking more cloud providers in error. Unfortunately, I've just had blanket replies to the form I submitted, with no clear indication, and asking me to post on here (which is difficult, given this isn't really suitable for Stack Overflow). LinkedIn don't seem to be making it easy for developers to work with them, as there is no mechanism to report things which you believe are a problem their side with the API, joining their partner program to access support seems to be the only option I can see.