WordPress: Blogger Importer 403 Auth Error — THE FIX!!

UPDATE: The Blogger import plug-in has been updated since this article was written. You may download and run the tool successfully on the WordPress platform.

For those of you who read my workaround post regarding this issue, there is now an actual fix so that you can use the Blogger Importer without retrieving a 403 authorization error. A few simple tweaks in the plugin coding will have you on your way in no time!

1. Find the blogger-importer.php file which should be located in /wp-content/plugins/blogger-importer.
2. Locate line 99 which reads:

$token = preg_replace( ‘/[^-_0-9a-zA-Z]/’, ”, $_GET[‘token’] );

3. Change it to:

$token = preg_replace( ‘/[^%-_0-9a-zA-Z]/’, ”, $_GET[‘token’] );

4. Find line 108 which reads:

preg_match( ‘/token=([-_0-9a-z]+)/i’, $response, $matches );

5. Change it to:

preg_match( ‘/token=([%-_0-9a-z]+)/i’, $response, $matches );

That’s it. Run the Blogger importer like you normally would and VOILA — 403 auth error problem solved!