Constant Loss of Internet Access & SIM Locking since 6.8 Update

Apps & Core Settings
1

So, since I updated to 6.8 at the weekend I have had ongoing and ever increasing internet access outages. And my physical SIM keeps randomly locking for some reason - requiring it’s PIN to re-enable (which isn’t good if someone is trying to contact me).

Internet Connectivity loss happens on both SIMs and every wi-fi I connect to (and simultaneously) - the latter work fine for every other device connected to them, and my phone (BraX3) shows valid IP, DNS, Gateway, etc, assigned to it from them. Both SIMS have plenty of mobile data available. This has only started since Monday, and I did the OS upgrade Sunday Night and there is nothing else notable I’m aware of that’s happened prior to Monday, not any settings I have changed. The phone had been working fine for the 2 weeks prior (on 6.7) and not exhibited any issues.

Physical SIM locking is just random - and makes me wonder if the system is constantly rebooting something in the back end, without actually rebooting the whole device or OS?

It’s now Thursday evening and pretty much I have to constantly restart my phone to get internet access temporarily, before it soon tells me there’s no internet access on any of my connections again. In some instances it takes 2-3 restarts to get internet access back. After 4 days of it it has now become a major pain.

I thought it was my VPN so I uninstalled that yesterday (Wednesday) afternoon - but its continued and arguably got worse (i.e. more frequent), so that wasn’t the cause. It was happening whether the VPN was active or not previously. FWIW it was ProtonVPN and I know that has occasionally caused issues for people with it’s kill-switch function - but doesn’t seem to be the case this time.

I also have battery saver and data saver and such all turned off too, so assume it’s not from something going into hibernation or such like…

So I am now stumped - and not clear how to easily check and test internet connectivity and such. I had a vaguely similar problem with Linux PC recently and the issue was it wasn’t getting DNS server’s from the DHCP for some reason - but the phone is showing valid DNS servers in the wi-fi details for each network I connect to - so it’s probably not that, unless it’s ignoring those values?

Haven’t come across much of use from searching either…

2

I added the brax3 tag to this, but I haven’t seen others with this issue (here at least on this forum, as I am not active on the brax forum currently). Are there others confirming this issue with the brax3? It seem really surprising.

1 Like
3

Yes, is happen to me also. On the Brax3 I don’t have issue as of now with the SIM card I do have a actual card.
Im running iode unofficial 6.8 on a oneplus nord i.e Larry with the same issues. The problem extends to the apps in particular to the bank apps.
If you need to test something, I be your happy to help.

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As an aside I found this old 2022 thread yesterday that seemed to describe the same or similar issue - but no resolution I could see at that time?

EDIT: Further update on this (events Friday 10 October my time) - the internet access continued to experience a couple of unexplained black outs to access - for no apparent reason - and happened across all interfaces (wi-fi, regardless of what WLAN I’m on, and both my SIMs, so all 3 interfaces simultaneously - but note no VPN, as I have uninstalled that to eliminate it as a cause).

Two new or different things however were (in no particular order):

  • I did not get the exclamation mark warnings on the 2 SIM and the Wi-Fi icons at top right of the phone home screen, and
  • The access just ‘rematerialised’ after about 10-20 minutes each time without me doing anything (i.e. I didn’t reboot or do anything else, I just left the phone and checked in my browsers again sometime later if they had access).

As I’ve previously had vaguely similar issues on my Linux PC (continuous lack of internet access for no reason), that I attribute to ProtonVPN and it’s kill switch function (even after uninstalling), I would like to investigate my phone network stack and settings in more detail. But as I’m not overly familiar with Android, and haven’t found any useful guidance a little stalled in that area. I can easily see in the wi-fi connection details the DHCP data and if it has a valid gateway, DNS servers, etc; but can’t see those details for the cellular data (SIM) connections that I can find; and not sure where i can verify what the phone is actually using (on my PC I found even though it had DHCP info it wasn’t using all of it, only the IP address being issued, so it had no or invalid DNS server addresses and gateway address - which I attributed to the VPN for lack of any other obvious cause).

5

Physical SIM card failure is not uncommon ( ~0,3%/year), and a SIM card repeatedly asking for the PIN is a classic symptom. One possible solution is to clean the pins with a bit of alcohol. Trying in another device may confirm the SIM is bad, but it doesn’t always reproduce the issue. It shouldn’t take too long to get another SIM from your provider to rule out this scenario.

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I’m going to try the SIM card as per brinerustle. I will keep you inform.

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I swap SIM cards between phones, the brax3 after the change had no more issues. I can say the same for the oneplus nord i.e Larry. I can really make since of this, I’m still scratching my head.

8

My update as follows:

  • No more physical SIM Locking at random times - this happened 2-3 times the first 2 days since I did update to 6.8 and hasn’t happened again since. May be coincidental so no way to pin it to 6.8 update, etc.
  • Ongoing random loss of internet is still happening, still no VPN installed either. Consistently behaves as follows:
  1. when I first use the phone in the morning after a few minutes all internet access (e.g. in all browsers, discourse app, etc) is lost on all interfaces (wi-fi and both cell networks). There is no longer any loss of internet indicator (i.e. no ‘!’ icon on wi-fi or Cell Data Icons) when this happens. A reboot results in an initial no internet ‘!’ on all 3 interfaces (for about a minute) then it disappears; and access is restored to the internet on all interfaces…
  2. Item #1 above then repeats itself around late morning/lunch-time (as on a work day that’s typically the first occasion when I have time to do any significant internet activity after arriving at work) - the events are identical.
  3. Have not then noticed it a third time later int he day - but typically my usage patter sees me on Linux PC or otherwise once home and not actively using my BraX3 as much…

Again no way to definitively tie this to the 6.8 update, but has now been ongoing for 9 days at time of this post…

9

Absolutely baffling, but I am sure it is absolutely infuriating? So maybe your phone is taking morning coffee / lunch / dinner? :slight_smile:

Somehow it seems the cellular or wifi network stack is crashing or something, maybe related to a wifi SSID change / config or something when you change locations?

10

Yeah, and you’d wonder!
:roll_eyes:

No, I dont think so @rik, as its like it when I first wake up so has been on the home WLAN all night and obvioysly no location change for cellular connectivity.

Looking at my e-mail inbox last two days its consistently failed sometime after 2am or so - as the last emails are just after 2am or so and when I restart I get a whole pile of emails timed from about 3am on come through.

Last 2 days its started doing this weird thing where when I reboot to regain internet access I get the internet access but the 2 cellular status icons are showing ‘!’ marks indicating no internet access even though I have it and am not connected to any Wi-Fi… My understanding is that’s specifically an internet data issue indicator, right?

This is how it looks right now while I am typing this using mobile data at my work office…

Screenshot_20251016-071253_Iodé Browser_1
Screenshot_20251016-071253_Iodé Browser_1720×136 11.1 KB

Screenshot_20251016-073958_Iodé Browser_1
Screenshot_20251016-073958_Iodé Browser_1720×149 12.3 KB

It is a bit frustrating now, as having to do all these constant restarts not sure if that’s detrimental to the hardware (esp. Battery given start up routine would be a particularly heavy draw on it); but I am also starting to wonder if its possibly a hardware issue? However, its only been since I did the 6.8 update so still thinking its OS related for now…

Any thought’s? Is it worth formerly logging this as a bug with the iodéOS devs?

11

This may be related to this : Iode Blocker blocks all internet traffic until re-toggled - #10 by vince31fr

1 Like
12

Yes I was thinking that myself yesterday @vince31fr but its intermittent not ongoing… But I will try that regardless and advise.

13

Just confirming @vince31fr and @rik applying the interim patch for the above issue seems to have resolved my issue described here around internet access.

The SIM card locking has not reoccurred since the initial 2 days it happened over two weeks or so ago - so will assume that was an anomaly and not a recurring issue.

1 Like