Coming from #33592 which was closed as a duplicate of this. I also had a similarly named task appear in Task Manager as a startup application, enabled by default. I have since disabled it due to not needing it. The full filepath is C:\Program Files\BraveSoftware\Brave-Browser\Application\118.1.59.117\BraveVpnWireguardService which differs from the service listed in services.msc(Brave Vpn Wireguard service) which has a path of C:\Program Files\BraveSoftware\Brave-Browser\Application\118.1.59.117\BraveVpnWireguardService\brave_vpn_wireguard_service.exe

do you guys know when the beta will get this fix so my computer does not have the brave vpn anymore

It is terribly disappointing that a security-branded browser is doing something blatantly insecure. At least you are rolling back the change... but how did this get approved in the first place? I sing Brave's praises to family and friends, please don't give me a reason to change that.

Now I wonder if they do that on Android. Because inside the Brave Browser, there is an entry in the browser menu Brave VPN, to which when touched, part is open where it asks for subscription.

@Marko-98 no, there is no service on Android.

@joshwenke I can understand the concerns by folks about bloat (ex: services or files put in place which will never be used) - but I'm a bit puzzled at how adding a service equates to Brave being insecure? We wrote the code ourselves and applied our same review process to it. The services are off by default... but even if turned on, there's no action taken by the service unless you 1) have purchased VPN and 2) are connecting. Our security team has worked to review the code thoroughly to make sure having these doesn't increase the attack surface for Brave.

Code is included in Brave for features even if people don't use them. For example, if you choose not to use vertical tabs, the code for vertical tabs is still there.

We're actively making changes so that no services will be registered / no dependencies downloaded until you purchase Brave VPN and turn it on.

Thanks for your patience. When I have more information (link to pull request, link to code branch) I'll share here

but I'm a bit puzzled at how adding a service equates to Brave being insecure?

Silently installing bloatware without an end user's consent is a definition of insecurity.

Code is included in Brave for features even if people don't use them. For example, if you choose not to use vertical tabs, the code for vertical tabs is still there.

You're joking right? Vertical tabs doesn't install a windows service without telling people... For a privacy based browser you guys certainly have a blatant disregard for people's privacy and consent. How many more fiasco's will you guys continue to have before you knock it off or people completely lose trust? Don't think some of us haven't forgotten about the whole referral code issue a couple years ago. Personally my patience is growing thin.

We're actively making changes so that no services will be registered / no dependencies downloaded until you purchase Brave VPN and turn it on.

This should have been done at the start. There's zero excuses.

Thanks for your patience. When I have more information (link to pull request, link to code branch) I'll share here

I'm expecting you guys to do better and put clear policies in place to avoid these types of things. Privacy and consent need to be at the front and center of Brave itself. Controversial features like this should always have an opt-in or at the very least a way to disable/uninstall it from the start.

OK folks - have an update. I'm doing some experimenting and we should be able to have a nice and clean solution soon.

We'll have to iron out some details about the experience (talking with the team on that), but you can see my prototype branch here:
https://github.com/brave/brave-core/compare/bsc-brave-vpn-client-component-updater

I'll continue to work through this and will share updates as they happen.

@Dskobra fair point on setting a boundary on installing a service. We have a privacy policy here:
https://brave.com/privacy/browser/

I reviewed and we do have VPN captured in the privacy policy - but these recent changes on Windows (installation of service) are not covered there. I've already pinged the appropriate folks to get that updated. And we can revisit once the planned changes are completed and released.

We have already made changes to processes within the company to help prevent future issues from happening. This is a learning experience and I'm trying to be as transparent as possible. Thanks

@Dskobra fair point on setting a boundary on installing a service. We have a privacy policy here: https://brave.com/privacy/browser/

I reviewed and we do have VPN captured in the privacy policy - but these recent changes on Windows (installation of service) are not covered there. I've already pinged the appropriate folks to get that updated. And we can revisit once the planned changes are completed and released.

We have already made changes to processes within the company to help prevent future issues from happening. This is a learning experience and I'm trying to be as transparent as possible. Thanks

I appreciate you working towards a solution and trying to be as transparent as possible. However, this situation was definitely not transparent. Personally I was more unnerved to find a system tray icon and auto start entry for something I never used. I don't know if this was rushed or what happened, but I think a way to disable the feature and remove it should have been included when being pushed to the user.

Anyway hopefully this is a lesson learned and I don't see any future surprises.

having a browser that auto-updates itself in the background, and in that process it installs an application as a Windows service that autoruns at startup...
yea... I don't see any problem at all

and it even re-enabled the Services on its own... congratulations

@bsdinis1 I deleted your first comment above because it's not adding anything and was abusive. Let's keep things constructive and respectful here please.

Your second comment above captured the problem. Services were re-registered after Brave updated.

Until we solve this issue (which we are actively working on), the services will fix themselves on upgrade if you installed as Administrator. That is due to how Omaha and the mini-installer work. All of the logic for the mini-installer will run on each update.

We're working through a few different proposals for how to solve this entire issue. As shared, there have been some prototypes happening. Will update once we have more to share.

Like I said in my other comment, in the 'old issue' that was closed as being a Duplicated of this, If any of you don't want to see 'VPN installed', in any new update, which is obvious it is going to do that, then uninstall Brave and Install it WITHOUT admin rights.

There is NO reason why 99% of people have to install a browser, unless you share your computer with someone, and you want all users to have the most up-to-date version and don't re-use disk space, then Per-User installation should be what users do.

The problem is doing a Per-User install is not obvious, but it is easy.
All you need to do is to say no when it asks for admin rights, then you will get asked if you want to install it without them.

So first, since you already installed Brave with admin rights is to Uninstall Brave and wait, go to Task Scheduler or taskschd.msc and make sure the two tasks are gone and the updater is uninstalled in program files (x86), if not, it will create a mess because you will have two different updaters if you rush and install Brave without admin rights.

Then download the installer from https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/releases/tag/v1.60.104 or whatever version you previously have, search for BraveBrowserStandaloneSetup.exe or BraveBrowserStandaloneSilentSetup.exe.

Silent will install automatically without admin rights, so it might be better, although you won't get any confirmation or anything or nothing when it is finished installing, you might see Brave gets added to desktop and taskbar but that's it.
normal Standalone version asks for admin rights, so just say no to get the "do you want to still install without admin rights?"

You can also use Winget, which uses the silent installer.

winget install -e --id Brave.Brave in Terminal that will install Stable version. (you can get the others here

benefits of user Per-User install? no services installed, including updater.

The updater will run as a startup process which can be easily disabled if you desire. Task Scheduler tasks are still added, which you can also disable if you desire for the people who 'don't want automatic updates'.

It is simple as that, if people want to avoid services to be installed, then don't give admin rights. if you installed Brave with admin rights, you already allowed Brave to install VPN.

Brave will fix this someday eventually, but people can help but stop complaining when they can easily 'fix it' by doing what they had to do from the beginning, Per-User installs, because I am sure you are not sharing your device with other users, that have their own Windows accounts, so giving admin rights to a browser is just nonsense even if it is the Default behavior.

There is NO reason why 99% of people have to install a browser, unless you share your computer with someone, and you want all users to have the most up-to-date version and don't re-use disk space, then Per-User installation should be what users do.

@Emi-HoloGhostRevisionist88 this is actually not necessarily true if you use vpn and want the best privacy protection on Windows. System-wide protection against the Windows multi-homed DNS leak https://support.brave.com/hc/en-us/articles/11973307463181-What-is-the-Brave-VPN-and-the-Windows-Smart-Multi-Homed-Name-Resolution-Feature- require admin to temporarily set firewall rules that prevent DNS resolution on the non-vpn interface (the source of the dns leak).

Without admin, only Brave itself is protected by using DoH instead of the system DNS resolver. Brave browser does not run with elevated priviledges, but a small helper service that is only enabled with Brave VPN does run with the necessary priviledges and it automatically enables the firewall rules whenever the VPN is running. It runs as a background service because the vpn itself can continue to run even if Brave is closed and we want to make sure the firewall rules are always removed when the vpn is not connected.

However, this is only a problem if the dns server for the local interface is on the same network. Many routers proxy dns requests and set themselves as the DNS server in DHCP.

Personally I was more unnerved to find a system tray icon and auto start entry for something I never used. I don't know if this was rushed or what happened, but I think a way to disable the feature and remove it should have been included when being pushed to the user.

@Dskobra this is definitely a bug and should not have happened. Something that is actually running by default is definitely in a completely different category from registering services that are not running by default. We will address both issues, but the tray icon running without enabling the vpn is not intended behavior afaik and if it was, that was a judgment error that will be corrected.

We're actively making changes so that no services will be registered / no dependencies downloaded until you purchase Brave VPN and turn it on.

This should have been done at the start. There's zero excuses.

@Dskobra Brave is run by people and people make mistakes and sometimes they only register as mistakes in hindsight. If people feel like Brave is trying to do something sneaky then they should just use a different browser. If I thought Brave was trying to do something sneaky, I would find a different job.

I see some people calling this bloatware, but I have a hard time seeing how a very good privacy feature that is integrated into a privacy focused browser qualifies as bloatware. Should the services have been installed by default even if they are not enabled by deafult? No. Should the tray icon be enabled by default? Definitely not (this is a bug). Should we have shipped the actual binaries separately from Brave? Personally I don't see a problem with shipping code that only runs when enabled. As @bsclifton said, we ship all kinds of code that not all users enable.

Maybe some explanation would help. The primary reason for registering the services by default in the "manual" state (and by extension shipping the binaries for those services) is that some functions (like the fix for the windows mutlti-homed DNS leak mentioned in a post above) require admin to run and the browser does not run with admin privileges. The updater can run with admin privileges because that is necessary to update a system install of Brave so we used the updater to register the services, but did not set them to start automatically. If you are an admin user, you could say this is not necessary because we can prompt for admin when needed and you can accept or deny that. However, if you are a regular user with a system install of Brave you have no way to allow this and you would not get the benefits of things like system-wide protection from the windows multi-homed DNS leak. Was this the right trade-off? In retrospect no because we don't want to upset our users or make them think we're doing anything sneaky. We hear that you feel this was not the right decision and we're going to change it. I can't guarantee that we're never going to make a decision you don't agree with again (or make a mistake), but I can tell you that we will never intentionally do that or try to be sneaky about it, at least not as long as I'm working here because I would quit if we started doing that.

@bridiver
Well, my post was aimed at people who 'don't want to use VPN' and don't want to get it reinstalled on every update until this is fixed, some people will delete the service through terminal which is the worst possible workaround, so if they are going to keep doing that, and follow bad practices, I think it is better if they just switch to Per-user installation and forget about this.

The whole admin vs non-admin rights is a big issue in software in Windows, like Windows giving users full admin rights to anyone was always problematic, this is why malware and virus get installed, so while it is necessary for some stuff, it should also be planned better. So installing per-user creates less security issues, but you are right, sometimes is a most to have a service.

But talking about Brave VPN, for example, since I never got VPN installed, I never noticed VPN installing like this, so I never reported and raised the concern about it, I wonder why other Nightly users who install with admin rights didn't report it.... but speaking about me, I have reported 3000 million other issues since I am Brave user, so I would have reported this as well.

Now since I never got installed VPN, this raise the question, what about per-user installed Brave users? people who used Winget or the silentinstaller? if per-user Brave users want to use VPN, do they have to install Brave with admin rights to get full protection? or are you going to implement a way so users can get the same best privacy protection on Windows or it is not possible? like a little button people can push to install the VPN as service or something with information about it and benefits?

The good thing is most people already just give admin rights when installing Chromium browsers already, so this situation will not apply to most people, but I think it has to be done in a way benefits all brave users, like, even if I didn't install Brave with admin rights, I should be able to get VPN installed as a service to make it work better, but also, even if I installed with admin rights, I should be able to run the VPN only while the browser is running, not just running 24/7 if people desire.

The option of 'system-wide all the time' is nice, but some people don't want or need VPN to run as service 24/7.

But anyway, this 'switch to per-user installation' guide for anyone who cares, was for people who aren't going to get VPN ever anyway, you know, if it is not free, they will not pay for it therefore it is useless for them, like you say, some people will wrongly call 'bloat' to anything, and sometimes people gotta do something about it if they can If people aren't patient until your fix, then, like in this case, they can use Brave without admin rights or just switch browsers or whatever they want to do, but this is about if people don't want to bother with automatic updates, with VPN, and all, services are going to always be an obstacle that can be avoided if they desire.

Happy to share that this is FINALLY merged. Thanks for all of you that have been patient! This change touched a lot of places in the code. We had to find a good solution, refine it, and then go through testing with it.

The fix will be in the next Nightly we have publicly. From there, I'll be working with the QA team to uplift this into Beta first and then Release next. If you're on Nightly and you don't have Brave VPN purchased, you'll see the services disappear tomorrow morning after updating 🎉

Some of our next upcoming release dates - the fix should be in one of these. It may also be in a hotfix in between them.

• 1.62 - January 23rd, 2024
• 1.63 - February 20th, 2024

Going to do some clean up here as discussion here got a bit off topic. If there are some specific grievances, let's please create a new issue 😄 Thanks!

OK one last follow up - after the code fixing this issue has been merged to 1.64 (Nightly), there have been two more follow ups:

• Updated Wireguard enabled state timing
• Removed install_static deps from vpn component

Those are merged into 1.64 (Nightly) also. There is one outstanding change which is under review now.

• Switch vpn protocols during the runtime

This last change is necessary to prevent a regression. We have the 1.63 release coming up soon (next week) and I don't think we'll be able to uplift the changes there due to time limitation. But tomorrow, we're planning on moving 1.64 (where the change is) to Beta. If you're a Beta user, you should see the services get removed tomorrow when 1.64 ships and you receive the update.

This means we can expect the change on RELEASE channel (stable) on March 19th with the 1.64 release 🙂

Will we get ability to remove VPN part on Android as well?

I mean, it just sits there and has no use to users that aren't subscribed to VPN service. Many times mistakenly entered the VPN ad because it's location is on match where other web browsers have desktop site feature.

The problem is doing a Per-User install is not obvious, but it is easy.

what a disingenuous comment. the install process tries to adhere to the windows standard of Everything Gets Admin. don't turn the blame away from disrespectful behaviour

Verification PASSED using

Brave | 1.64.94 Chromium: 122.0.6261.94 (Official Build) beta (64-bit)
-- | --
Revision | 866e3a4bd76c9cc1762928df0cf9a53b8685ab71
OS | Windows 10 Version 22H2 (Build 19045.4123)

Clean install - PASSED

Steps:

1. downloaded https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/releases/download/v1.64.94/BraveBrowserStandaloneBetaSetup.exe
2. double-clicked on BraveBrowserStandaloneBetaSetup.exe
3. confirmed UAC prompt
4. waited for install to finish
5. clicked Close on "install finished" dialog
6. opened Add/Remove programs
7. confirmed Brave Beta 122.1.64.94 was installed on 3/4/2024
8. opened service.msc and confirmed only one BraveBetaElevationService
9. logged into account.bravesoftware.com using [email protected]
10. clicked on Refresh Brave VPN
11. opened services.msc and confirmed BraveBetaVpnService and BraveBetaVpnWireguardService (both set to Manual)
12. connected to Brave VPN
13. confirmed via external source whatismyipaddress.com that I'm connected to Brave VPN; also confirmed via brave://settings/system that I'm connected using WireGuard
14. loaded http://browserleaks.com/dns and confirmed the local DNS resolver wasn't leaked (shows Cloudflare instead)
15. confirmed BraveVpnBetaWireguardTunnelService was Running
16. disconnected from Brave VPN and toggled Use WireGuard.... to disabled/off
17. connected to Brave VPN
18. confirmed only BraveBetaVpnService was running (no WireGuard processes)
19. loaded http://browserleaks.com/dns

Confirmed no DNS leaks over either WireGuard or IKEv2, and I was able to switch between them dynamically

step 7	step 8	step 11	step 12	step 13a	step 13b	step 14	step 15	step 16	step 17	step 18	step 19

Upgrade - removal of VPN service - PASSED

Steps:

1. installed 1.64.3 (build WITHOUT fix)
2. launched Brave
3. opened services.msc
4. confirmed BraveNightlyVpnService, BraveNightlyVpnWireguardService, and BraveNightlyElevationService processes
5. right-clicked on BraveNightlyElevationService and chose Start
6. confirmed error message
7. installed 1.64.94
8. launched Brave
9. opened services.msc
10. confirmed all BraveNightly... services are gone
11. right-clicked on BraveBetaElevationService and chose Start

Confirmed BraveBetaElevationService was successfully Running

steps 3-4	step 6	step 11/result

Upgrade - pre-existing Brave VPN user - PASSED

Steps:

1. Have a profile which already has a Brave VPN subscription
2. Run steps from Upgrade scenario - removal of VPN service
3. The VPN button will still be visible in the browser. Click it to bring up the server connection screen
4. At this point and time, the services should be installed.
5. Verify Brave VPN works
6. Open services.msc and search for the VPN services.
7. Verify both VPN services are shown. Name will be like:
   Brave Beta Vpn Service (BraveBetaVpnService)
   Brave Beta Vpn Wireguard Service (BraveBetaVpnWireguardService)

Confirmed BraveBetaVPNService and BraveBetaVpnWireguardService were running

example	example	example

Upgrade - user purchases Brave VPN after upgrade - PASSED

Steps:

1. Have a profile which does NOT have Brave VPN
2. Run steps from Upgrade scenario - removal of VPN service
3. Logged in to account.bravesoftware.com with a new account
4. Clicked Buy VPN
5. Completed Stripe checkout
6. At this point and time, the services should be installed.
7. Verify Brave VPN works
8. Open services.msc and search for the VPN services.
9. Verify both VPN services are shown. Name will be like:
   Brave Beta Vpn Service (BraveBetaVpnService)
   Brave Beta Vpn Wireguard Service (BraveBetaVpnWireguardService)

Confirmed BraveBetaVPNService and BraveBetaVpnWireguardService were running

example	example	example	example

@Marko-98 you should already be able to remove VPN using group policy, which I admit is not very straight-forward at the moment (I've never tried to do it before on Android). There might be something special we need to do for Android

We have the group policy (as it related to Desktop) documented at https://support.brave.com/hc/en-us/articles/360039248271-Group-Policy - when BraveVPNDisabled is set to 1, it should hide the UI elements. Same with BraveRewardsDisabled, BraveWalletDisabled, etc

@bsclifton I just disabled the VPN through the brave:flags on Windows and it's not present anywhere in the UI. That solved it for me.
I prefer flags anyway because when I manage it through Group Policy, I get that annoying message everywhere that the browser was managed by my organization (as expected). It also doesn't let me open the small menu on internal Downloads page (#35793) then, so that's why I prefer flags instead.

In my comment, I was asking specifically about the Android version of Brave. Because there isn't a flag that would allow me to do the same.

Thanks for your work guys! I really appreciate it. 😉

Verification PASSED using

Brave | 1.64.96 Chromium: 122.0.6261.111 (Official Build) beta (64-bit)
-- | --
Revision | fb9feca2d1f25ea20265752e8ecdf548a6925bd4
OS | Windows 11 Version 23H2 (Build 22631.3155)

Clean install - PASSED

1. downloaded & Installed BraveBrowserStandaloneBetaSetup.exe for `1.64.96 via https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/releases/download/v1.64.96/BraveBrowserStandaloneBetaSetup.exeUAC prompt
2. clicked Yes on UAC prompt
3. opened Add/Remove programs
4. confirmed Brave Beta 122.1.64.96 was installed on 3/6/2024
5. opened service.msc and confirmed only one BraveBetaElevationService
6. logged into account.bravesoftware.com, purchased & subscribed to VPN for [email protected]
7. verified VPN credentials loaded
8. opened services.msc and confirmed no services - BraveBetaVpnService and BraveBetaVpnWireguardService (both set to Manual) shown yet
9. clicked VPN button
10. opened services.msc and confirmed no services - BraveBetaVpnService and BraveBetaVpnWireguardService (both set to Manual)
11. connected to Brave VPN
12. confirmed via external source whatismyipaddress.com that I'm connected to Brave VPN;
13. confirmed via brave://settings/system that I'm connected using WireGuard
    loaded
14. http://browserleaks.com/dns and confirmed the local DNS resolver wasn't leaked (shows Cloudflare instead)
15. confirmed BraveVpnBetaWireguardTunnelService was Running in services.msc
16. disconnected from Brave VPN and toggled Use WireGuard.... to disabled/off
17. connected to Brave VPN
18. confirmed only BraveBetaVpnService was running (no WireGuard processes)
19. loaded http://browserleaks.com/dns
20. confirmed no DNS leaks over either WireGuard or IKEv2, and I was able to switch between them dynamically

step 3-4	step 5	step 6-7	step 8	step 9	step 10	step 11

step 12	step 13	step 14	step 15	step 16	step 17	step 18	step 19

Upgrade - removal of VPN service - PASSED

Steps:

1. installed 1.63.141 (build WITHOUT fix)
2. launched Brave
3. opened services.msc
4. confirmed BraveBetaVpnService, BraveBetaVpnWireguardService, and BraveBetaElevationService processes
5. right-clicked on BraveNightlyElevationService and chose Start
6. confirmed error message
7. installed 1.64.94
8. launched Brave
9. opened services.msc
10. right-clicked on BraveBetaElevationService and chose Start

Confirmed BraveBetaElevationService was successfully Running

step 1	steps 3- 6	step 7	step 10/result

Upgrade - pre-existing Brave VPN user - PASSED

Steps:

1. Have a profile which already has a Brave VPN subscription
2. Run steps from Upgrade scenario - removal of VPN service
3. The VPN button will still be visible in the browser. Click it to bring up the server connection screen
4. At this point and time, the services should be installed.
5. Verify Brave VPN works
6. Open services.msc and search for the VPN services.
7. Verify both VPN services are shown. Name will be like:
   Brave Beta Vpn Service (BraveBetaVpnService)
   Brave Beta Vpn Wireguard Service (BraveBetaVpnWireguardService)

Confirmed BraveBetaVPNService and BraveBetaVpnWireguardService were running

example	example	example	example	example	example	example	example

Upgrade - user purchases Brave VPN after upgrade - PASSED

Steps:

1. Have a profile which does NOT have Brave VPN
2. Run steps from Upgrade scenario - removal of VPN service
3. Logged in to account.bravesoftware.com with a new account
4. Clicked Buy VPN
5. Completed Stripe checkout
6. At this point and time, the services should be installed.
7. Verify Brave VPN works
8. Open services.msc and search for the VPN services.
9. Verify both VPN services are shown. Name will be like:
   Brave Beta Vpn Service (BraveBetaVpnService)
   Brave Beta Vpn Wireguard Service (BraveBetaVpnWireguardService)
10. Disconnected VPN and Wireguard toggle off in brave://settings/system

• Confirmed BraveBetaVPNService and BraveBetaVpnWireguardService shown
• Confirmed BraveBetaVPNService status shown running in IKEv2 mode
• Confirmed BraveVPNBetaWireguardTunnelService status shown running in Wireguard mode

example	example	example	example	example	example	example