What to do if Blokada won't activate / start?

Guides Android
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If you experience problems simply starting up Blokada, you may need to do a few more steps to make it work on your device.

All devices

Here are steps you should try if you keep getting failures when trying to activate the app, despite what device you use:

  1. Remove Blokada’s VPN profile, in your system preferences (search for “VPN”). Sometimes it’s called “forget” or “revoke”. Then, try to activate Blokada again;
  2. Restart your device (if the first step did not help);
  3. Clear app data for Blokada in your system preferences.

Samsung

Update: Samsung has released another update that seems to fix the previous update, however, the Dual Messenger may still interfere. If you did not receive the update yet, try to find it manually in settings: Settings -> Biometrics and Security -> Security Update. You may also find it through Settings -> Software Update.

There is a known bug that Samsung’s August 2020 update brought to their devices if you are using the “restricted user” feature of the system.

Workarounds:

If you use, disable Dual Messenger. It seems that still causes issues and prevents to use the android.permission.INTERACT_ACROSS_USERS

Another way is:

  1. Make sure you have ADB installed on your PC/notebook. If you don’t have, please refer to this guide: How to Install ADB on Windows, macOS, and Linux
  2. Make sure you have Blokada for Android v4.8 (for v4 line), or v5.1 (for v5 line), or newer.
  3. Ensure your phone is connected to your PC/notebook using an USB cable
  4. Use adb to execute this command once:
adb shell pm grant org.blokada.origin.alarm android.permission.INTERACT_ACROSS_USERS

Now Blokada just activate just fine.

Alternatively, stopping using the “restricted user” feature, and just having one user on your Samsung device, should also help.

5 Likes
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Something else, perhaps? If we have Blokada 4.x or 5 installed from F-droid, even if not activated, then don’t try to upgrade or change version, without uninstalling the original version first, or it simply won’t install. The OS message simply says unknown error, presumably meaning a fingerprint error where the installer doesn’t recognise it’s a different version? At least it seems to be the case on vanilla Android 10, but at least all my original settings, including Plus, automatically came back on the fresh install, without the need for reconfiguration.

Sadly from experience it seems the original version might not uninstall properly, so it might be necessary to reinstall and uninstall the original version again before trying to upgrade again. A pain, but it’s worth it!
A strange thing too is that it seems only v4.9 will install when no other version will!

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Hi,
If you’re using an F-Droid version you can only install updates available on F-Droid.
If you’re using the website version you can only install updates available on the website.
Both apks are signed differently due to the nature of the fdroid store

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What can I do

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Hi,
You can follow the guide.

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Ative now

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Errrrrrrmmmmmm… Yes. lol