Quote from Proton VPN:
Google has known about a bug that breaks VPN apps for 7 months, leaving users exposed with no warning or error, just a VPN app that stopped working in the background.
If you're using ANY VPN on Android, you can help us by getting Google's attention to fix it.
We first reported this bug to Google in September 2025.
Others like Mullvad and Wireguard reported it even earlier, in August.
Google's response? "I don't see anything unusual."
The bug corrupts Android's network stack at the system level after a VPN update, causing users to blame their VPN provider.
Restarting the app doesn't help, with the only fix being a full device reboot or VPN app reinstall, something which most users never figure out.
This affects several VPN providers on Android 16, and only Google has the access to diagnose it properly.
After 7 months of waiting, we're now asking publicly: Google, when are you fixing this?
Issue Tracker Links:
45 Comments
lath@piefed.social · 80 pts · 170d
It's a feature.
Emotional_Engi@lemmy.zip · 24 pts · 170d
Especially considering the trend, yes, it's definitely a feature.
Keshara@piefed.world · 43 pts · 170d
SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social · 11 pts · 170d
Shit like this is the reason I've given money to mobile Linux projects
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net · 7 pts · 170d
Hell yeah, thanks for donating! For anyone else reading, I'd suggest donating to PostmarketOS, if you have the means. They're doing extremely good work building the foundation we'll be able to use to escape Android and google forever.
SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social · 2 pts · 170d
I'm just curious how I'll manage to get to my second factor app for my bank to run.
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net · 5 pts · 170d
A lot of bank apps actually work fine on Graphene, there's a list of working ones here: https://privsec.dev/posts/android/banking-applications-compatibility-with-grapheneos/
SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social · 2 pts · 170d
Nice, both my bank and Wero are listed. Do you think this can be adapted for postmarket?
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net · 3 pts · 170d
It's possible that the android app could be run through a compatibility layer such as waydroid, but that would need separate testing to confirm if the app is compatible.
punkibas@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 169d
Just tested on postmarketOS and both Aegis and my bank app work fine through waydroid. My bank alerts that my phone is somehow modified and that I should be careful.
So I guess they do detect it, but some banks may or may not allow you to use their app in that case. (My app works on graphene too btw)
skuzz@discuss.tchncs.de · 3 pts · 170d
SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social · 2 pts · 170d
I'm sure this will happen but I also know that we will be the first adopters so we will have to figure out how to communicate our wishes.
01189998819991197253@infosec.pub · 1 pts · 166d
Any word on Signal working on Postmarket? That's basically the only thing keeping me from switching, as I rely on signal daily. Whatsapp would be good, too, but I don't mind having a dedicated, wifi only device for that heap.
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net · 2 pts · 166d
From this page, it seems to still have problems, but I'm not sure how up-to-date it is.
BlackLaZoR@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 169d
Wireguard on Linux can't even autostart with the system.
Damarus@feddit.org · 11 pts · 170d
So that's why my AdGuard stopped working sometimes since the upgrade. I specifically set it to VPN mode as that used to be more stable than proxy mode.
QuandaleDingle@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 170d
Google will ban VPN apps next, I guarantee it.
TrickDacy@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 170d
What you didn't say was what reason you have for thinking they would do this. "They're getting shittier all the time" is true, but isn't an actual reason.
skuzz@discuss.tchncs.de · 8 pts · 170d
QuandaleDingle@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 170d
You're right, I don't actually know why they would ban vpns, other than governmental pressures. A bit of a knee-jerk, there. :)
TrickDacy@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 170d
So without even a law they would just do it.? Yeah knee jerk is a mild way of putting it
forrgott@lemmy.zip · 0 pts · 170d
Was there a law against ad blockers?
The answer is always to follow the money. With Google, you are the product. Your data is their money source. VPNs interfere with this.
The other guy us right. Google abso-fucking-lutey is going to ban em. Mark my words.
TrickDacy@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 169d
Ad blockers don't prevent work from being done. VPNs are used for work by many many people. Kinda alarmist and baseless to think they're going to disregard that
forrgott@lemmy.zip · 0 pts · 169d
That's not their money. And they are not in this to be altruistic. I doubt they would care.
Besides, that's always a feature they can restrict to some kind of business plan.
And to be frank, expecting any goodwill from them is dangerously naive. The very idea that Google, who are FAMOUS for randomly canceling projects and services, regardless of the impact, would so much as even notice the damage their actions cause is quite simply ludicrous.
TrickDacy@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 169d
I'm expecting the opposite of goodwill. I'm expecting greed. Companies don't buy phones from companies that remove their ability to do work. A lot of large companies buy phones. Again: alarmist.
skuzz@discuss.tchncs.de · 2 pts · 170d
Sophocles@infosec.pub · 8 pts · 170d
Would this affect android-based OSes like lineageOS? Or can they patch something like that?
GreenKnight23@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 170d
likely will affect them, but now that it's been disclosed will probably get patched immediately (but not by google).
Electricd@lemmybefree.net · 4 pts · 170d
It has been disclosed for a while…
GreenKnight23@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 170d
yes, but were the vendors that provide lineage/eos/etc aware of the disclosure?
probably not.
moonshadow@slrpnk.net · 4 pts · 170d
Yes to both?
Hiro8811@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 170d
On grapehene os and hasn't encountered mentioned bug.
forrgott@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 170d
I would honestly be surprised if the Grapheme network stack wasn't fully rewritten. So yeah, my money is this bug did not propagate to their codebase.
Any other android custom ROM I would be careful with, though...
Calfpupa@lemmy.ml · 4 pts · 170d
Seems like they may have around this time
webkitten@piefed.social · 5 pts · 170d
Zanathos@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 169d
My self hosted wireguard has no issues, so no idea what this is on about... I leave my VPN connected for many hours at a time and never had a crash as this post is indicating. Sounds device specific, but have not seen the issue on my S22U or S26U.
TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 170d
That explains a lot. Although I never had to restarty phone, my Mullvad occasionally just crashes for no reason and there is no indication.
SailorFuzz@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 169d
VAK@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 170d
Thank you, I've been wondering what's going on
FEIN@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 170d
is A15 the last good version of Android
webkitten@piefed.social · 1 pts · 170d
nebulahhh@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 1 pts · 169d
don't do this use GrapheneOS instead
webkitten@piefed.social · 1 pts · 169d
nebulahhh@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 1 pts · 168d
Your still better updating than having unpatched vulnerabilities (it sucks that google is like this)
Electricd@lemmybefree.net · 1 pts · 170d
Wanted to switch from iOS to android but honestly I’m wondering more and more if that would even be useful
Also, the fact that the kill switch feature also kills LAN sucks
dukatos@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 169d
I am doing the opposite. If I have to use locked down system, I'll use the one with better hardware and less spyware.
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net · 2 pts · 170d
Switching to a Pixel phone to access GrapheneOS would still be worth it, and a massive increase in privacy and security.
Electricd@lemmybefree.net · 1 pts · 165d
Frankly, since I would run sandboxed play services, it would still send massive amounts of telemetry to google, so eh, not so sure about privacy. It also knows all apps installed on the device. That's why microG is nice.
Security, yea, sure, but I'm not too worried about that.
dukatos@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 169d
They also fucked up notifications somewhere around October - they are always 15-20 minutes late. I tried everything in settings, nothing helped. They are aware of the issue but they don't give a fuck.