Netgate Discussion Forum
    • Categories
    • Recent
    • Tags
    • Popular
    • Users
    • Search
    • Register
    • Login

    Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved General pfSense Questions
    185 Posts 27 Posters 160.2k Views
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as topic
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with topic management privileges can see it.
    • stephenw10S
      stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
      last edited by

      Mmm, I assume you are seeing the same intermittent behaviour as other users? It's not failing for every query with that configuration?

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • I
        Isotope1842 @jimp
        last edited by

        @jimp I just re-checked that single setting. DNS appears to continue to work. Curious to see whether it starts to fail again at some point.

        jimpJ S 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • jimpJ
          jimp Rebel Alliance Developer Netgate @Isotope1842
          last edited by

          @isotope1842 said in Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL:

          @jimp I just re-checked that single setting. DNS appears to continue to work. Curious to see whether it starts to fail again at some point.

          Since you hit it once it's likely to fail again at some point, but nobody has yet to be able to pinpoint exactly when/why it happens.

          I've been periodically checking my lab systems and they all just keep resolving no matter what I do. But they are lab systems so the load is considerably lower than it would be in a live environment.

          Remember: Upvote with the ๐Ÿ‘ button for any user/post you find to be helpful, informative, or deserving of recognition!

          Need help fast? Netgate Global Support!

          Do not Chat/PM for help!

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • S
            SteveITS Galactic Empire @Isotope1842
            last edited by

            @isotope1842 There are a few threads on this topic, or variations thereof, and in another one someone posted their problem seemed likely to happen when opening a group/folder of bookmarks/favorites at once...implying a higher number of simultaneous requests might trigger it.

            I was also unable to replicate my issue by simply (re)checking the DNSSEC option, but I left it off as recommended.

            Pre-2.7.2/23.09: Only install packages for your version, or risk breaking it. Select your branch in System/Update/Update Settings.
            When upgrading, allow 10-15 minutes to restart, or more depending on packages and device speed.
            Upvote ๐Ÿ‘ helpful posts!

            J 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • N
              nononono
              last edited by nononono

              After playing alot more - it might be an issue with Quad9's TLS DNS limiting responses more than anything.

              While there is nothing helpful in the pfsense logs, Quad9 just appears to stop replying and then start responding again - almost as if there is a limit being imposed by Quad9 on requests - but of course pfsense must have some role as it never occurred before 23.01

              This network is a very high traffic network, so maybe others that see the same thing manage high traffic networks as well - either way the only long term solution has been doing TLS DNS through Cloudflare

              As another point - DHCP lease registrations is definitely not fixed as claimed in 23.01, unbound still likes to reboot too much to consider enabling it - as such at the most I am still only registering the clients that need it via static mapping.

              cmcdonaldC johnpozJ 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 1
              • stephenw10S
                stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                last edited by

                Hmm, that would explain why we haven't been able to replicate it in test setups without the loading a production box has.

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • cmcdonaldC
                  cmcdonald Netgate Developer @nononono
                  last edited by

                  @nononono

                  There were memory leaks and a segfault that were fixed. There is still ongoing work to eliminate the unbound reloads associated with lease registration events. I'm hopeful it will make it in 23.05.

                  Need help fast? https://www.netgate.com/support

                  N 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
                  • N
                    nononono @cmcdonald
                    last edited by

                    @cmcdonald said in Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL:

                    @nononono

                    There were memory leaks and a segfault that were fixed. There is still ongoing work to eliminate the unbound reloads associated with lease registration events. I'm hopeful it will make it in 23.05.

                    That is great to hear! Hopefully that finally is solved

                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • johnpozJ
                      johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @nononono
                      last edited by

                      @nononono said in Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL:

                      DHCP lease registrations is definitely not fixed as claimed in 23.01

                      Where is that stated? What it says is a "crash" was fixed when unbound restarting

                      https://redmine.pfsense.org/issues/11316?#note-79

                      Where does it say that unbound is not going to restart on dhcp registrations.. The issue with unbound restarting every time there is something going on with dhcp is ok for some users.. but if you have clients renewing lever few minutes then your still going to have issues with unbound and dhcp - even if they fixed some crash that could happen.

                      An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                      If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                      Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                      SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

                      S 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • S
                        SteveITS Galactic Empire @johnpoz
                        last edited by

                        @johnpoz said in Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL:

                        What it says is a "crash" was fixed when unbound restarting

                        It may be referring to https://docs.netgate.com/pfsense/en/latest/releases/23-01.html "A long-standing difficult-to-reproduce crash in Unbound...It is now safe again to enable DHCP registration alongside Unbound Python mode in pfBlockerNG." ...which is talking about pfBlocker vs DHCP, not that DHCP registration won't restart Unbound anymore. (I've seen others post about this sentence as well...)

                        Pre-2.7.2/23.09: Only install packages for your version, or risk breaking it. Select your branch in System/Update/Update Settings.
                        When upgrading, allow 10-15 minutes to restart, or more depending on packages and device speed.
                        Upvote ๐Ÿ‘ helpful posts!

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • J
                          JonH @SteveITS
                          last edited by

                          @steveits said in Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL:

                          someone posted their problem seemed likely to happen when opening a group/folder of bookmarks/favorites at once...implying a higher number of simultaneous requests might trigger it.

                          Playing around with various settings, and I don't know if this has anything to do with the quoted comment, but I raised incoming and outgoing tcp buffers in resolver adv settings from default 10 to 20. I believe (or imagine) that it has reduced the frequency of unbound 'hangs' on my system.

                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                          • S SteveITS referenced this topic on
                          • J
                            joedan @nononono
                            last edited by

                            @nononono

                            Just thought I would comment on this as I am seeing the same symptoms. It only just started happening recently and thought it was load related but not much has changed on my end except upgrading PFSense and associated packages.

                            I have turned parameter off this for now... Use SSL/TLS for outgoing DNS Queries to Forwarding Servers as I need the stability.

                            Summary:

                            • Using Cloudflare SSL/TLS on 23.01 (ipv4 / ipv6 resolvers)
                            • Build: 23.01-RELEASE (amd64) built on Fri Feb 10 20:06:33 UTC 2023
                            • System Patches package with recommended fixes applied including a manual patch for redmine #13851
                            • Machine Core(TM) i5-8365U, 16GB Ram, 128GB SSD
                            • Internet Connection 100/20
                            • Running a number of wireguard gateways (3 servers, both ipv4 and 6)
                            • Running a number of packages including...
                              e257f7ae-ab01-4aa5-91ef-1c449961926f-image.png

                            According to PFBlockerNG graph, my dns reply stats are around 10-20K per hour during the busiest times.

                            Over the last week or two, uptime Kuma randomly alerted me to dns issues which is the same time my family complained they couldn't access any websites or their game would fail stating their was no internet. This would happen randomly and would take a couple of minutes to clear up again.

                            6aa79f4f-4ceb-4366-8bd1-ba147a3abf0b-image.png

                            310ac4e7-91e3-4a68-951e-4ad8dc03ca93-image.png

                            Fortunately I had graylog setup and unbound in debug mode for the most recent errors above.

                            Looking at the logs I note the following messages around the time where DNS briefly cut out...

                            5a24ac71-1017-42a2-bfec-b70abba94bc9-image.png

                            Looks like PfSense is not processing DNS requests quick enough for me. The sample above occurred whilst the internet link wasn't even loaded, neither was my machine.

                            I have turned this setting off and will monitor... Use SSL/TLS for outgoing DNS Queries to Forwarding Servers

                            I haven't done any further debugging and I hope this helps someone out, if not I apologise for this long post.

                            johnpozJ 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • johnpozJ
                              johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @joedan
                              last edited by

                              @joedan said in Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL:

                              10-20K per hour during the busiest times.

                              In your home? how many devices / users - you have a lot shit banging its head trying to resolve stuff your blocking.. That seems really high for a home..

                              That is what like 240K to 480K queries in 24 hours.. I see like 50k in 24 hours, and that is with 28 active devices doing dns.. Many of them banging their heads looking for shit that is blocked.

                              queries.jpg

                              An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                              If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                              Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                              SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

                              J 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • S
                                skogs
                                last edited by

                                I also had occasional dns failures when using quad9 dns. I simply turned off forwarding mode and have had no issues with root servers doing the work.
                                I find this to be non-ideal, but at least functional.

                                JeGrJ 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                • N
                                  n8rfe
                                  last edited by

                                  Just reporting in here that I have the same issues with 23.01 and Quad 9 DNS when using unbound DNS

                                  My settings were as follows on 22.05 since 22.05 was released with no issues with internet and DNS resolution.

                                  • pfsense ubound DNS resolver enabled

                                  • Using forwarding to Quad 9 DNS servers

                                  • DNSSEC unticked

                                  • Use SSL/TLS for outgoing DNS Queries to Forwarding Servers TICKED

                                  Upgraded to 23.01 this weekend just gone 2nd April 2023. No other settings have changed on LAN network and no other firmware's have been upgraded on any devices on network so I am confident that the only change was the upgrade to pfsense from 22.05 TO 23.01.

                                  Everything worked fine yesterday 3rd April until this morning when I now get multiple DNS resolution issues and cannot reach websites.

                                  I have now changed the following single setting.

                                  • Use SSL/TLS for outgoing DNS Queries to Forwarding Servers UNTICKED

                                  Websites are now resolving correctly.

                                  I will continue to monitor DNS resolution over the coming days to see if the issue reappears and report back.

                                  N 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                  • J
                                    joedan @johnpoz
                                    last edited by

                                    @johnpoz said in Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL:

                                    In your home? how many devices / users - you have a lot shit banging its head trying to resolve stuff your blocking.. That seems really high for a home..

                                    Yes I have around 35 devices, a few that are quite bad including a Swann Security DVR that is taking up 25% of that DNS traffic calling out dropbox domains even though I don't have that function setup.

                                    Just wanted to loop back and advise I did resolve my issue however it involved going back about 6 backup iterations and manually reapplying all my config changes one at a time and am now back on DNS over TLS (Cloudflare) with 23.01, and all recommended patches applied. I did also move ISP's during that time of panic so unfortunately have nothing further to contribute here because I was under pressure to get things working again quickly and made significant change in such a short time.

                                    I was never using Quad9 though which appears to be an ongoing issue with other posters.

                                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                    • GertjanG
                                      Gertjan
                                      last edited by Gertjan

                                      @joedan said in Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL:

                                      a few that are quite bad including a Swann Security DVR that is taking up 25% of that DNS traffic calling out dropbox domains even though I don't have that function setup

                                      Introduction : read this first.

                                      If a device asks ever x seconds to resolve an identical host name, then, at first, your uplink isn't used : pfSense will just serve the same info edit : from local DNS cache, as log as this is TTL permitted end edit to the device again, and again. You're just burning some watt hours at your place.
                                      But if the TTL is short, like mere minutes or less, then, yeah, the WAN gate is opened, and you start to activate a whole lot more of software/hardware on both sides

                                      The thing is : as I said in the other thread : if you were looking at the WAN gate of quad9 (because, lets imagine, you work over there) : what would you do if you saw that some IP was clearly misbehaving ? => You throttle ?! As "just scale up the system up once more" without any cash flow in return will kill your job.
                                      So, on your home site : your entire DNS just got delayed.

                                      And that's of course a 'pfSense DNS bug' ๐Ÿ˜ 

                                      No "help me" PM's please. Use the forum, the community will thank you.
                                      Edit : and where are the logs ??

                                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                      • stephenw10S
                                        stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                                        last edited by

                                        I agree this could be Quad9 throttling responses. But still it would have been the same in 22.05.

                                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • JeGrJ
                                          JeGr LAYER 8 Moderator @skogs
                                          last edited by

                                          @skogs said in Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL:

                                          I find this to be non-ideal, but at least functional.

                                          Not wanting to start a big base line debate but why is letting a resolver do resolving non-ideal? Letting your box do DNS resolving on its own without any upstream forwarder that can be censored is a much more resilient setup (as we see) then having a single point of failure like a big DNS forwarder that throttles or censors DNS lookups (or in case of quad9 is jurisdically forced to do so). Just to try to hide your DNS queries from your ISP?

                                          Just asking because I'm interested.

                                          Don't forget to upvote ๐Ÿ‘ those who kindly offered their time and brainpower to help you!

                                          If you're interested, I'm available to discuss details of German-speaking paid support (for companies) if needed.

                                          johnpozJ 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 4
                                          • johnpozJ
                                            johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @JeGr
                                            last edited by

                                            @jegr said in Major DNS Bug 23.01 with Quad9 on SSL:

                                            Just to try to hide your DNS queries from your ISP?

                                            hahah - which isn't really happening anyway. So I do a dns query for www.amazon.com, which I want to hide from my isp ;)

                                            So my isp doesn't see the dns query, but they see me go to IP address 1.2.3.4 which pretty obvious is amazon.com - and here is the big one.. They still see what you are asking for - its just not via dns..

                                            Until such time that esni, which is dead - long live ech.. Is everywhere - you are just sending your sni in the clear in your handshake - so who exactly are you hiding your dns query from? And for what purpose?

                                            clienthello.jpg

                                            An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                                            If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                                            Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                                            SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

                                            ? 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
                                            • First post
                                              Last post
                                            Copyright 2025 Rubicon Communications LLC (Netgate). All rights reserved.