[PFB_FILTER - 17] Failed or invalid Mime Type: [application/octet-stream|0]

tinfoilmatt

This has come up (at least on this forum) here, here, here, and here.

As of today, I have a CE 2.8.1-RELEASE system with pfBlockerNG-devel 3.2.10 installed, and which during execution of...

/usr/local/bin/php /usr/local/www/pfblockerng/pfblockerng.php dcc

...the following error is printed to the pfblockerng.log file:

[PFB_FILTER - 17] Failed or invalid Mime Type: [application/octet-stream|0]

Upon additional inspection of extras.log, it appears that the error is being thrown specifcally during the attempted download of (configured-to-use-on-my-particular system) the Tranco TOP1M feed. Relevant snippet:

Download Process Starting [ 11/20/25 16:14:45 ]
 /usr/local/share/GeoIP/GeoLite2-Country.tar.gz		200 OK
 /usr/local/share/GeoIP/GeoLite2-Country-CSV.zip		200 OK
 /var/db/pfblockerng/top-1m.csv.zip		200 OK

Failed to Download top-1m.csv
 /usr/local/share/GeoIP/asn.mmdb		200 OK
 /usr/local/share/GeoIP/asn.csv.gz		200 OK
ASN Lookup Table has been updated [ 11/20/25 16:14:53 ]
Download Process Ended [ 11/20/25 16:14:56 ]

Country code update Start
 Processing ISO IPv4 Continent/Country Data
 Processing ISO IPv6 Continent/Country Data [ 11/20/25 16:15:31 ]
 Creating pfBlockerNG Continent PHP files
 IPv4 Africa			 [ 11/20/25 16:15:56 ]
 IPv6 Africa			 [ 11/20/25 16:15:57 ]
 IPv4 Antarctica		
 IPv6 Antarctica		
 IPv4 Asia			
 IPv6 Asia			 [ 11/20/25 16:16:01 ]
 IPv4 Europe			 [ 11/20/25 16:16:04 ]
 IPv6 Europe			 [ 11/20/25 16:16:13 ]
 IPv4 North America		 [ 11/20/25 16:16:21 ]
 IPv6 North America		 [ 11/20/25 16:16:33 ]
 IPv4 Oceania			 [ 11/20/25 16:16:43 ]
 IPv6 Oceania			 [ 11/20/25 16:16:44 ]
 IPv4 South America		
 IPv6 South America		 [ 11/20/25 16:16:45 ]
 IPv4 Proxy and Satellite	 [ 11/20/25 16:16:46 ]
 IPv6 Proxy and Satellite	
 IPv4 Top Spammers		
 IPv6 Top Spammers		
 pfBlockerNG Reputation Tab
Country Code Update Ended

Given the previous posts, and setting aside that this same issue has been observed with other feeds and at least one other unaccounted for MIME-type (i.e., application/SIMH-tape-data), I assume that if I add application/octet-stream to the list starting at L257 of /usr/local/pkg/pfblockerng/pfblocker.inc, then the download will complete and be parsed correctly. In fact, I had done that prior to the most recent package update and temporarily resolved the issue.

@BBcan177, any insight as to why this 'fix', i.e., adding application/octet-stream to the list of acceptable MIME-type downloads, hasn't yet been officially made?

This issue is particularly elusive because the error is printed rather nondescriptly to the pfblockerng.log, which is easily 'buried' within normally logged update operations—and because, so long as the TOP1M feed is successfully downloaded and parsed just one time, the package will continue to reuse its stale copy.