I’m encountering a persistent issue with my Network Extension (specifically NEFilterDataProvider) and would really appreciate any insights.
The extension generally works as expected, but after some time — especially after sleep/wake cycles or network changes — a global network outage occurs. During this state, no network traffic works: pings fail, browsers can’t load pages, etc. As soon as I stop the extension (by disabling it in System Preferences), the network immediately recovers. If I re-enable it, the outage returns instantly.
I’ve also noticed that once this happens, the extension stops receiving callbacks like handleNewFlow(), and reinstalling the app or restarting the extension doesn’t help. The only thing that resolves the issue is rebooting the system. After reboot, the extension works fine again — until the problem reoccurs later.
I asked AI about this behavior, and it suggested the possibility that the kernel might have marked the extension as untrusted, causing the system to intentionally block all network traffic as a safety mechanism.
Has anyone experienced similar behavior with NEFilterDataProvider? Could there be a way to detect or prevent this state without rebooting? Is there any logging or diagnostic data I should collect when it happens again?
Any guidance or pointers would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!