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Firewall apps, monitor network activity, block ads and trackers, bypass Internet censorship, and more.
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v0.5.3e - 15 April, 2021
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  • Thu Apr 15 2021
    053e
    F-Droid and Faves
    1. DNS Logs UI now shows website icons corresponding to DNS queries. These icons are fetched from DuckDuckGo. To enable / disable this see the Settings screen.
    2. An edge case during app start-up where all connections were may be incorrectly allowed while the firewall rules were being loaded has been fixed.
    3. Changes to the way the app recovers from the 'Waiting' state. Sometimes, before this fix, the app could forever be stuck in 'Waiting'. After this fix, it shouldn't.
    4. Dark Mode for the RethinkDNS 'Configure' page (in the DNS UI). Thanks Amith!
  • Fri Apr 02 2021
    053d
    Fix the Internet release
    1. Major updates to how the app handles connectivity changes. This fixes issues where devices may have previously lost Internet connectivity with the app switched on.
    2. True Black theme on popular demand. Check the Settings -> Appearance.
    3. Improvements on themes: Better consistency in the colour scheme.
    4. Stop button in the Notification bar.
  • Wed Mar 17 2021
    053c
    Orbot Setup & Other improvements
    1. Support for one-click Tor-as-a-proxy (Orbot setup).
    2. When the network is unavailable RethinkDNS now reports "bad network connectivity" to the Android OS. This might improve scenario where apps do not recover from poor / flaky networks.
    3. Report bad-network to Android when DNS connections fail and healthy network when they succeed.
    4. OISD.NL (full) is the only default list on RethinkDNS starting this release.
  • Wed Mar 03 2021
    053b
    Themes & more
    1. Themes: Dark and Light themes.
    2. Support for F-Droid builds with jitpack.io.
    3. Fix battery drain issue
    4. Home and Welcome screen UI changes.
    5. Improvements to the underlying Firewall and DNS network engine
  • Thu Jan 28 2021
    053a
    Incremental update
    1. Better support for the "Always-on VPN" feature.
    2. Home screen UI refreshed.
    3. Improvements in "Block apps not in use" behavior.
    4. Enable / disable auto-check for app updates.
    5. Major performance and stability bug fixes.
  • Sun Dec 27 2020
    053
    Android 6 support & Battery Saver mode
    The app now runs on Android 6 and above.
    Battery Saver Mode:
    1. The app now bundles in a battery saver mode in which only DNS works but not Firewall.
    Homescreen:
    1. Start / Stop now looks more like a traditional button with a bottom sheet to help choose between battery-saver DNS-only mode and full-fledged DNS + Firewall mode.
    2. DNS and Firewall buttons on the homescreen are now more prominent.
    Settings:
    1. Enable or disable on-device DNS and Firewall logging.
    2. "Refresh app list" button moved to the Firewall screen.
    DNS:
    1. Latest 20K DNS logs are stored on-device.
    2. Search box and filters for DNS logs.
    Firewall:
    1. Fix for Whitelist reverting to default.
    2. Fix for Exclusion list reverting to default.
    3. All apps tab now shows total number of app, number of apps in the whitelist / exclusion list, and number of apps blocked.
    4. Improve scroll performance of the Network Log screen.
    5. Network Log bottom sheet now slightly less cluttered: A couple of UI elements removed.
    6. Distinguish between "unamed" (connections from apps without a name) and "unknown" (orphan connections without an owner app) in the network logs.
    7. Improvements to app UX when the VPN is run in "lockdown mode" (that is, when "Block connections without VPN" is enabled from Android's VPN Settings page).
    8. Some apps retry relentlessly when their connections are firewalled: Gatekeep connections for 30 seconds to delay those fast-paced non-stop retries.
    Universal Firewall:
    1. "Block any app not in use" now with better heuristics and so should behave in less surprising ways and be more out-of-the-way.
  • Wed Nov 04 2020
    052
    Rebrand to RethinkDNS & 30+ New features
    DNS
    1. Support for RethinkDNS+ (a configurable DNS resolver with custom blocklists) deployed to 200+ locations world-wide.
    2. Support for DNSCrypt v2 with Anonymized Relays.
    3. Support to forward DNS requests to other apps like Nebulo or PDNSF.
    Firewall
    1. Support for "Always-on VPN" and "Block connections without VPN" (this is enforced by Android and is full-proof in that it blocks all internet traffic that bypasses VPN ensuring nothing escapes the RethinkDNS firewall).
    2. Exclude apps from VPN, that is from the RethinkDNS firewall altogether.
    3. Whitelist apps from RethinkDNS firewall rules (but not DNS).
    4. Block all connections when source app is unknown (this occasionally happens with UDP traffic that the source app cannot be determined at times).
    5. Block all UDP traffic except DNS traffic.
    6. Block IP addresses apps are connecting to individually from the "Network Log" screen.
    UI
    1. DNS Firewall screens see a major UI overhaul.
    2. A bottom sheet in "Network Log" now shows some relevant actions (block app, block IP, kill app).
    3. A tap on DNS logs entries now shows more information including blocklists.
    4. Select and copy app names and IP addresses from both "DNS Logs" screen and "Network Logs".
    5. A search bar in all firewall screens.
    Proxies:
    1. Forward TCP connections to any SOCKS5 endpoint.
    2. Set a HTTP/S proxy endpoint.
  • Sat Sep 05 2020
    044
    Bug fixes & Other improvements
    Bugs:
    1. 'Start' button now shows just fine for Right-to-Left languages, like Arabic and Hebrew.
    2. App now doesn't auto-start on phone reboot.
    3. A critical stability fix that caused frequent app crashes in the background.
    4. Changes in 'block when app not in use' behavior which now works as originally intended.
    5. "Always-on VPN" related prompt is shown now when user taps the 'Start' button.
    6. A minor fix for 'app won't start' bug in Samsung devices.
    Refactor:
    1. Faster loading times for 'Network Monitor'.
    2. A textbox now warns users to exercise caution when blocking 'System Apps`.
RethinkDNS Firewall is a free and open source project, released under Apache License, Version 2.0.
iOS?
A lot of our users have asked us for iOS support. We are already discussing buying a Mac to make this happen. Stay tuned. Write to us in case you've got any questions or suggestions: hello (at) celzero (dot) com.