I have the paid version of GW, purchased today, on my Windows 7 Dell XPS desktop computer with 16GB RAM. First, I exit the GW program, by clicking the upper GlassWire drop down menu on the top left of the screen, and then selecting the Exit. I notice three serious problems, which indicate that the program is still in fact open:
(1) If the Firewall was ON when I exited GW, the program firewall will still be operative after exiting GW.
(2) GW will still monitor and record all network outgoing traffic
(3) There are still two GW programs running when i check the task manager.
It seems that GW is Always ON, and I will have to completely uninstall this program to avoid these problems. What’s the point of never being able to exit this program? Did i do something wrong here? I feel like a moron for buying the program without first checking out the free version. This program seems to have other bugs too, but this is the most serious flaw.
Thanks in advance.
I’m not sure what you actually expected or what features you use GlassWire for so I can’t address that issue.
Yes, GlassWire remains running so it can monitor network traffic.
You are only exiting the GlassWire user interface when you select Exit.
In a similar manner you exit the user interface for antivirus software and their service keeps running.
FYI, GlassWire uses the Windows firewall which is also always running.
From the taskbar, right-click [Glasswire] > [Exit]
Either of those two steps above should address the majority of your concerns.
Regarding “… two GW programs running” in Task Manager: the default view for Windows Task Manager shows processes versus programs. Most programs/ applications spawn multiple processes, this is standard.
Also, I’m unsure what you mean by “the program firewall” in your comment about “… the program firewall will still be operative after exiting GW will still be operative after exiting GW.”
Yes, GlassWire is a network security monitoring software so it runs all the time. We use the Windows Firewall API for blocking. This is so if you block an application or malware it will stay blocked even on boot up of your PC before GlassWire starts. Most IT and Infosec Professionals use the Windows Firewall for custom rules for their devices and servers. GlassWire does not interfere with those rules. In fact if you leave the GlassWire Firewall on “Off” it does not touch your rules at all.
If you’re worried about privacy there are several things you should know about. First of all your network activity never leaves your device at all. https://www.glasswire.com/privacy/ We could not see it even if we were forced to under court order, because it’s on your device and we have no way to access it.
Second of all you can go to the top left GlassWire menu and turn on “Incognito” mode. In this mode GlassWire does not log anything. Or just go to GlassWire’s settings to clear your history any time.
Or, make your browser, or any application you want “Incognito”. Find the app you want to make incognito in the firewall, then click its icon, then “more” then choose incognito.
First of all, I do appreciate all of your prompt replies. Thanks for clarifying issues about GW works. To netninja, I tried both methods for exiting GW, and it still logs internet activity and still blocks programs after I have exited. Sorry, i meant processes, not programs, in the Task Manager. The fact that there are active GW processes after I exit GW (using 1 or 2) explains why GW is still able to log and block after i exit GW.
I have a few more questions:
(1) Can I block Glasswire Control Central using GW firewall? Or is this necessary for GW to function properly?
(2) In full incognito mode, i can still see a graph showing network activity, although it doesn’t identify which programs are causing the network activity. Is this graph data stored in RAM, or on the hard drive? If the graph data is stored in RAM, then it gets deleted when i turn off my computer. If on the other hand, it’s stored on the hard drive, then it is not deleted.
(3) Do you have any data on how much GW slows down network activity (speed and latency), in order to perform it’s firewall function? Have you ever done a comparison with other firewalls, like Avast or BitDefender?
I have a few suggestions for future versions of GW
(1) Include a checkbox option in the settings menu which will turn off GW completely when exiting the program. There are occasions when I really do not want it to be functioning. Currently the only way to achieve this is by deleting the program. In it’s current form, the program is always on. So even if you turn off the firewall, it is still logging network activity of every program (process).
(2) Include an option in the settings, similar to Clear History, which will also clear total data usage from each program. I noticed that Clear History will only delete the graph data, and not the total data usage. Better yet, this suggested option would wipe all this data, by replacing with all zero’s.
Yes you can. And it uses the Windows Firewall API, so it’s actually blocked by Windows itself.
In full Incognito mode it should still temporarily show what apps/hosts you are connecting to on the graph. Click apps at the top left of the window. It is shown temporarily in RAM I think (I will ask), but it’s not stored on the HD.
Our firewall should not slow down anything at all because we use the Windows Firewall API. The products you mention use their own firewalls so I think they would be more likely to slow your network, and Avast recently confirmed they log a lot of what you do to sell to third parties, so this behavior might slow your network considerably. https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qjdkq7/avast-antivirus-sells-user-browsing-data-investigation
You probably already noticed that we don’t do that. https://www.glasswire.com/privacy/
Also the applications you are comparing us to are antiviruses so they don’t really do what we do. We do however have a cool poll made by @Remah that shows what antivirus applications GlassWire users like to use. We always suggest people use antivirus applications on Windows PCs. https://forum.glasswire.com/t/what-windows-antivirus-do-you-use-2020
Thanks for your other feedback and suggestions.
You can go to the task manager and kill our service there. It is called “GlassWire Control Service”. I don’t recall people asking us to have the ability to completely kill GlassWire easily through the app itself, but we will discuss this idea with our team and how it may help or hurt user security.
The history should also delete the info in the “Usage” tab, so there might be a misunderstanding here. It could be that when you went to “usage” again then GlassWire had already gathered some data between your deleting the data and checking the window.
By the way, some of our customers do like to run GlassWire in Incognito all the time because they just like the security alerts and firewall settings so that might be something you’re interested in if you prefer not to log anything ever. And of course we ourselves can never see your data or give it to a third party even with a court order and all encryption keys, because your GlassWire graph data never leaves your PC. We wish other companies did the same.
Hi Ken,
Thanks for the clarification. I’m starting to like this program. It’s light weight, not bloated, and has a nice interface. My biggest criticism is that the user manual should be more detailed. It will help your company reduce the help questions from customers. If a customer does need help, then you can refer him to the exact location of the user manual for the detailed answer. Nevertheless, I applaud your company in actually having a user manual at all. Most software companies do not.
I have a few more suggestions:
(1) Rename the list title “Active Apps” to “Allowed Apps”. The programs listed may not all be “active” at any given moment, but these are the programs (processes) which will be automatically “allowed” to access network (is this right?). Also the word “incognito” confused me on it’s functionality. Incognito means anonymous, and it’s not immediately clear that incognito’s function is not to store data on hard drive (it’s ok to store data in RAM). (I hope this is how incognito works). But, i understand that you have used “incognito” for many many years, so probably best to stick with it.
(2) Clarify for me how to change a firewall profile. For example, I am using a custom firewall profile which i created, with Ask to Connect. I see an alert for a process to have network access. I decide to either allow or block this request. Does my custom profile get automatically updated on what to do with this process (block or allow), or do i need to go to the top of the screen, and re-save my custom profile? In other words, how are custom firewall profiles edited? Consider adding this information to the user manual.
(3) GW doesn’t like when you block Glasswire Control Center. It gives you a message box alert, asking you to either unblock it, or to download a newer version of GW. So, it appears that you cannot block this process without affecting the function. Consider adding this information in the user manual as well.
The more detailed your user manual, the fewer annoying messages from customers like me!
Cheers,
Edward
Thanks for your kind words and feedback. We will work to make our help guide better in the future.
In case someone else is reading this that needs help, our help guide is here https://www.glasswire.com/help/.
I think we picked “Incognito” because several popular browsers use that terminology for their mode that doesn’t keep any browsing history. Since GlassWire is a historical network monitor we thought “Incognito” made sense for that name to not store network history.
I agree the profiles can be improved. We’re adding profiles to our Android app soon!
The custom profile will keep up with what you’re doing and it should save your settings, unless I’m misunderstanding the question.
