Is my Windows Server blocking my App from running properly?

Hi Folks,

I have a small program which pings a remote API to obtain football stats.

The App works fine on my W10 laptops, but as it runs 24/7 I decided to put it on a dedicated VPS server.

However, it isn't able to access the API remotely. Windows appears to be blocking any API calls.

I can access the API without a problem from the server using Firefox, so it doesn't appear to be an issue with the API, although IE doesn't work properly.

I checked the Event Log it shows the following:

An account failed to log on.
Subject:
    Security ID:        NULL SID
    Account Name:        -
    Account Domain:        -
    Logon ID:        0x0

Logon Type:            3

Account For Which Logon Failed:
    Security ID:        NULL SID
    Account Name:        ADMIN
    Account Domain:        

Failure Information:
    Failure Reason:        Unknown user name or bad password.
    Status:            0xC000006D
    Sub Status:        0xC0000064

I am guessing that the problem is with WIndows as my program has the API username/password hard-coded.

I've tried adding the program to the list of "safe aps", but it is still failing.

Any gurus out there have any ideas?

Many thanks,

Pete