Pi-Hole works everywhere except Android Phones

just to add in my issue once again, and apolgies to the OP for high jacking their thread....

I am using Pi-Hole as a DHCP server, and have it disabled on my ISP provided server.

The DNS setting is locked by my ISP and so i cannot maually set it within my router


Hello,

Install an application to change your DNS on your device, it's the solution if I'm not mistaken.

thats not a solution, its a workaround.

Hi,

Android phone use 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 for DNS, if you don't change this with an application, it's screwed up.

MOD EDIT: Please watch the language on posts, and please read the community guidelines.

Your current server.conf is set to use Google DNS, you have to change it

I have seen conflicted posts across various forums etc. Some say it works perfect others say not at all.

Using an ap IP tools it shows that my DNS server is my pi-hole.

Android also gives the option of manually setting the DNS.

So I think is is perhaps a mixture of problems within pihole and android.

That's strange.
When setting up PiVPN I entered my pihole IP address as DNS?

Just to add to this...

I modified /etc/OpenVPN/server.conf to state my pihole IP address and when connected via OpenVPN ads are blocked.

1 Like

Just a tip, commenting out push "redirect-gateway def1" will route only DNS queries. It'sā€‹ useful incase if you have low broadband speed on the server side, however you will loose the full encryption

Just coming back to the android problem.

I have tried on older android devices and ads are successfully blocked, so guess it's an android 6+ issue?

Very annoying, given my phone is the most device!

Good tip thanks.
But my speeds are pretty good, plus I wouldn't want to loose the full encryption, kinda defeats the object of a VPN!

Google uses a slick backdoor using port 443 on android that apparently dns queries use and more. They are bastards. Simple fix was to use VPN for me

How did you come about this information?

I recall seeing reports of the QUIC protocol being able to let the ads through...

pfense and capturing packets. I don't know 100% what goes on but blocking that ip range renders everything Google to stop. Including YouTube. They have upped the ante on their ads, they are everywhere and it's driving me nuts.

How is this only implemented in more recent versions of android though?
I have tested on a 4.0 device and pihole functions perfectly.
I'd have thought that anything they put I place for their benefit / gain would manifest in all things Google / android?

It's a real pain

The reason I don't want to be connected to my VPN 100% of he time is it seems to time out. So if my device is asleep, or not in use for a while, the VPN disconnects and when I unlock, I get a heap of notifications, mails etc.
I'm using the OpenVPN app for android.

Interesting. Thanks for sharing.

I think we'll have a continually difficult time going forward, and Google's a lot bigger than us...

There will be a way I'm sure of it. It's also rather scary that your phone can just bypass the dns in the network configuration, seems like a big hole that we are trusting everything to Google (phishing,etc).

It really is a crying shame.
I guess that from your (Pihole Dev) side it's something that you can't circumnavigate?

So the only workaround is the use of a VPN?

Well I recently got a new android(older version) and do not have the VPN setup on this one yet. But I noticed pihole was letting Google through at home and that's what brought me here. My computer using ad block with unlock currently is blocking YouTube ads but I believe it blocks the js code from running directly. Everything else in my house through phone is getting YouTube ads.

My newer android device (Galaxy S6 running android 6.0.1) is the only device in my network that allows adverts through.
So I figured it was an android thing, but was hoping there was a proper fix.

Use of a VPN is a workaround in my opinion.

And given the issues I have with VPN timing out and effectively putting me in an "offline" state it's not really viable for me.