Hi,
Former network engineer here. Yesterday went to a McDonalds and used two MacBooks. One just for something brief. The other for primary work over McDonalds network. Today that laptop will not go out online unless I use VPN. Tried this not only at home but over several other WiFi networks and my phone MiFi. Thought it was WiFi adapter, deleted and re-added. Connected hardwired same thing. Tried multiple DNS addresses. Keep in mind my other MacBook is working fine over the same networks as is my phone. Something is blocking my other MacBook. Is this some sort of virus? The last place I used was McDonalds.
TIA
Which VPN client are you using? I ask because many consumer-grade VPN clients these days include a VPN “kill-switch” which will cut off all network access entirely if you disconnect from the VPN. The idea is to prevent a dropped connection from exposing you to the internet while unprotected, but the trade-off is that you need the VPN connected to get online. It can sometimes be very easy to tap a button and toggle this setting on without knowing.
That is weird, since ur a network engineer maybe Im not being helpful asking but have u tried traceroute with and without the VPN? Does it stop at the networks gateway?
If that McDonalds is close to you maybe even try going back if their network will work for u haha.
Anyway I wouldn’t think it’s a virus rather than a bug or some weird setting you could’ve made.
Fired up 3rd Mac, getting out immediately no problems
Have you tried flushing the DNS cache?? I’ve had a similar problem that was equally weird and this did the trick
remove nord vpn and try again
Using avast and nord on both laptops. I have a 3rd MacBook I’ll bet if I fire it up it will go out
Welp, I’ll join the guessing game:
-When you’ve got both up and running, working and non-working, without vpn, do the dhcp details look similar? I know you said same settings, and dns, but I mean assigned IP/subnet type stuff.
-Can you ping local devices from the laptop with issues (and can local devices ping that laptop)?
-What about pinging something like 8.8.8.8, to see if it’s DNS or all traffic?
-Check silly things like /etc/hosts and /etc/resolv.conf to see if something got tweaked in one of those (compared to the working machine)?
Have you tried rebooting it?
I have this with my VPN and it’s firewall related.
Killswitches were never enabled. Traceroute off-vpn gets nothing….on vpn showed info for a couple of hops. So not getting past gateway at all. Remember this is across different networks/gateways.
also do you have some sort of firewall enabled on your Mac?
Thanks for the reply. I retired 8 years ago, rusty. So I forgot traceroute! Will do that now. That McDonalds is 2 hours away! Positive I made no new settings.
You might want to clear the ARP cache as well.
Ok. I removed avast already. Nothing changed. Put it back. Avast won’t connect anyway, only Nord will. Now here is something I did that I used to do back in the day that worked. I connected directly to modem and pulled public and it gets out over that without vpn connection. As of right now when going behind a router/Nat same issue.
Of course. Several times now and reset p-ram.
I removed both vpn and still doesn’t get out except with public IP
Have you tired uninstalling your VPN client completely?
Noooo. I been using these MacBooks for years. Not too much I run on them since I don’t work in that field anymore. Only VPN software which I use the same on both. Reset the clock also. Both Mac’s on same network with same settings and dns.
Do try that, will be helpful to know at what point the connection fails.