GW 2.2.268 keeps turning firewall back on!

[PhilipGoddard]

Since I installed this latest GW version I kept finding that Windows Firewall Control kept switching to Low filtering profile (it’s supposed to be on the default Medium filtering profile), and it was only today that I found that this appears to be resulting from the new GW version, which had the firewall locked in On state (evidently conflicting with WFC), whereas I want it always Off. I kept clicking on the On/Off button, and it just stayed On.

So, I reinstalled GW, and found that initially its firewall was off (great), but then not long after, I noticed WFC had switched to the Low profile again, and, sure enough, GW had switched its firewall back on. I was able to switch it off, but soon it had switched back on. I tried rebooting a few times with all the settings correct, but GW would turn its firewall on soon after its launching (with firewall initially off). – This seems really weird! – Never has this sort of behaviour from a program before.

This is hopeless behaviour and definitely needs fixing! I just hope it can be fixed quickly.

Anyway, heartfelt thanks to all the GW team for their great work, and I wish all you great people a much happier 2021 than this year!

[Ken_GlassWire]

@PhilipGoddard

We purposely built GlassWire so it will not conflict with other security or firewall applications as long as our firewall is set to “off”. Unfortunately many other applications don’t do the same…

It appears you are using two firewalls simultaneously. It is not ever recommended to use two firewalls simultaneously with a PC or network.

If you don’t want to use our firewall then you can switch it to “Off” under the firewall tab. Click the green button as shown below.

If that does not solve the problem instantly you can try the instructions below.

I suggest you uninstall GlassWire in add/remove programs, then reboot, then go to the Windows Firewall and choose “restore defaults”.

Now reinstall GlassWire with “reset firewall” and it should not touch the firewall anymore until you switch it to “on”.

“Low filtering profile” and “medium filtering profile” are not a part of Windows and this has nothing to do with GlassWire. These are options in a secondary firewall application you’re trying to use simultaneously with our own firewall.

It’s possible to use GlassWire purely for network security monitoring and never use our firewall feature at all if you prefer. Many IT and Information Security professionals use GlassWire in that way. That’s why we made GlassWire where it never touches the Windows Firewall API at all if it’s switched to “off”.

[PhilipGoddard]

Thanks greatly for your prompt response, Ken, and on Christmas Day too!

However,if you read my original post more thoroughly you’d see that the situation was not at all as you’d understood.

I was NOT at all deliberately using two firewalls at once! The point I tried to get across is that GW was repeatedly turning its own firewall on (I’d never turned it on), and causing me trouble because I wanted WFC and not the GW firewall!

There was clearly some buggy operation of this GW version, which wasn’t resolved by reinstallation / rebooting. I wanted the GW firewall to stay off, as I’d always successfully had in previous versions.

Anyway, I followed your instructions for doing a fully clean re-install, and that broke GW completely - in the sense that then it couldn’t operate at all. It did launch each time but stalled and timed out, with successive failed attempts to “connect to local network”. I tried further ‘clean’ reinstalls, including resetting Windows Firewall defaults, with a reboot each time, but GW still couldn’t connect to the local network, and wasn’t monitoring any traffic. And yes, I did ensure that GW was allowed in Windows Firewall Control (which means that it was supposedly allowed in Window Firewall).

So, I reverted to a rather older GW version - 2.2.241, again with a clean install. That worked just fine, so it appeared to be something specifically about the current GW version on my system.

Then I thought, just maybe that installation had cleared whatever problem the current GW version had been running into, so I tried yet again installing the latter, this time retaining all settings / data. Amazingly, that appears to have worked.

I’ll frequently check that GW’s firewall is staying ‘off’ over the next day or two.

So, an eventual sigh of relief after quite a ding-dong with GW this morning!

[Ken_GlassWire]

Sorry for the issue.

We will try to reproduce the problem on our end.

I can also say that if GlassWire’s firewall has ever been set to “on” and used, then if another app tries to turn off the firewall or change our rules GlassWire will revert to the previous rules. We had people specifically request this functionality as a protection of GlassWire’s own rules against malware or badly behaving apps.

However, if GlassWire’s firewall is never used and is set to “off” it will never touch the Windows Firewall API rules at all.

Maybe our firewall was set to “on” at some time in the past and you blocked something, and in that case GlassWire would try to protect its rules from other apps changing them and that would be expected behavior. Many users requested this behavior so that’s why we implemented it.

For anyone else reading this in the future, it is not recommended to use two firewalls simultaneously because it will cause problems with your PC or network. If you want to use GlassWire purely as a network monitor with no firewall features it’s absolutely possible, but please be sure to always keep our firewall to “off”. Once you turn on our firewall and add some rules then it can begin to conflict with other firewalls on your PC.

You can set GlassWire’s firewall to “off” then uninstall GlassWire, reboot, then reinstall with the “reset firewall” option checked and it should solve the issue. It should save all your other settings/history and paid mode if you only choose to “reset firewall”.

The reason GlassWire is built to never touch the Windows Firewall rules until it’s set to “on” is because many IT and Information Security professionals test and use our software with large organizations, and Fortune 500 companies. These professionals often have sophisticated rules set up with the Windows Firewall API, so we designed GlassWire to never touch these rules or conflict with any other security applications unless the user decides to purposely turn on and use our own Firewall.

[PhilipGoddard]

Thank you Ken for that explanation. That undoubtedly explains how GW can behave in the way that was happening for me.

The weird thing, though, is that I had never turned the GW firewall on since early in the history of GW, when for a short time I did use its firewall, then finding that it didn’t suit my purposes. Since then I’ve always been using GW alongside Windows Firewall Control, with the GW firewall off all the time - and with various new GW versions being installed, and the odd clean install being done when there was some specific (other) problem.

Anyway, now I understand better how to address this particular problem, should it ever arise again, and should be able to resolve the issue with minimal messing around or loss of settings - so thanks again, Ken.