Android 16 has had a bug for months that disconnects VPN applications

A fault present in Android 16 has been disconnecting for several months virtual private network applications (VPN) that run in the background, potentially leaving users exposed.

VPN providers such as Mullvad VPN, WireGuard and Proton VPN notified Google last year that their latest operating system has a flaw that makes VPN apps stop running in the background.

The first two companies gave notice in August and a month later Proton VPN reported this problem to the technology giant again. Given the lack of progress by Google to solve it, Proton VPN has exposed the situation publicly through X.

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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.

Details 👇 🧵

— Proton VPN (@ProtonVPN) March 18, 2026

As explained, the failure is triggered when the VPN application receive updates from Google Play, moment when is disconnected from the internet. If users are using it in the background, they may not even realize that their connections have not been made private.

“This bug corrupts the Android networking stack at the system level after a VPN update, causing users to blame their VPN provider,” he noted. He also assures that “this affects several suppliers of VPN on Android 16, and only Google has access to diagnose it correctly”.

Although restarting the application “does not help”, the tests they have done with this error have allowed them to discover how users can solve the problem. Specifically, they cite completely restart the smartphoneuninstall and reinstall the VPN app and switch to another VPN profile and reconnect using the crashing app.