GPT vision models suddenly cannot see image content from URLs

Question

As of 7am CET 2025-03-05, model gpt-4o (version 2024-11-20) which we use in a production app to analyze food images, has been saying "The provided image url is not accessible." with an error 403. The links were to valid signed timed URLs to S3 images. We support multiple AI services and when using those, such as OpenAI.com directly, there were no such errors.

It is working again now, but I'm curious if this was a temporary issue on Azure's end.

Answer 1

Hi @Marcel Salathe,

Thank you for reaching out and providing detailed information. I understand how concerning it can be when a production system experiences unexpected behaviour, especially with something as critical as image analysis.

From what you described, it seems like there may have been a temporary issue affecting Azure’s ability to access signed S3 URLs. Since the same URLs worked fine with other AI services, the issue was likely related to how Azure was handling external image requests at that time. This could have been due to a brief service disruption, a networking hiccup, or a temporary policy enforcement affecting URL accessibility.

Now that it’s working again, it suggests that the issue was short-lived and self-resolved. If this happens again, capturing detailed error logs and timestamps could help in pinpointing the root cause.

Please let us know if you notice any further issues or patterns. We're happy to assist in troubleshooting if needed.