Ads catalog cannot be accessed and no ads

[pralhadstha]

Description

I was getting ads before but it has been more than a week I haven't got any ads. I have diagnosed using this blog post
and the browser cannot open "https://ads-serve.brave.com/v2/catalog" URL.
I am using AWS EC2 instance and the issue seems to be persistent over AWS.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Have an AWS EC2 instance running windows server image.
2. Open "https://ads-serve.brave.com/v2/catalog" on any browser
3. Nothing displays in the browser
4. Check C:/Users/YOURUSERNAME/AppData/Local/BraveSoftware/Brave-Browser/User Data/default/ads_service and no catalog.json is found.

Actual result:

Blank screen appears.
The url: https://ads-serve.brave.com/v2 can be accessed and the below results appear:
{"statusCode":404,"error":"Not Found","message":"Cannot GET /v2"}

Expected result:

Show the JSON data that consists of catalog.json data.

Reproduces how often:

Easily reproduced

Brave version (brave://version info)

Build: 1.10.97 Chromium: 83.0.4103.116 (Official Build) (64-bit)
Revision: 8f0c18b4dca9b6699eb629be0f51810c24fb6428-refs/branch-heads/4103@{# 716}
OS: Windows Server OS Version 1809 (Build 17763.1282)

Version/Channel Information:

• Can you reproduce this issue with the current release?
  Yes
• Can you reproduce this issue with the beta channel?
  Not checked
• Can you reproduce this issue with the dev channel?
  Not checked
• Can you reproduce this issue with the nightly channel?
  Not checked

Other Additional Information:

• Does the issue resolve itself when disabling Brave Shields?
  No
• Does the issue resolve itself when disabling Brave Rewards?
  No
• Is the issue reproducible on the latest version of Chrome?
  Yes, also in firefox too.

[jsecretan]

HI @teddywest32 it is not recommended to use these over AWS instances as it makes it hard for the ad server to reliably determine the proper region for ads catalogs.