GlobalProtect auto-update fails, application breaks

[richferrara]

I am a software engineer on Long Island, NY. My company uses GlobalProtect VPN to allow us to connect remotely to our internal network. We were originally using SonicWall but transitioned to GlobalProtect when our company was sold two years ago.

When I am logged in from home, GlobalProtect will periodically check whether a new version is available. If it finds a new version, it attempts to automatically download and install the update. This update never works, and after it fails GlobalProtect becomes permanently non-functional. It just says "Not Connected", and if I click on the Connect button, nothing happens. Some websites suggested going into the Manage Portals screen, deleting all the portal names, and re-adding them. I've tried that and it didn't work. The only fix so far has been to have our I.T. department uninstall and reinstall GlobalProtect on my laptop. They've already had to do this 3-4 times because the failure keeps happening. As far as I know, I am the only employee in my department who is having this problem.

I am running 64-bit Windows 10 Enterprise, version 21H2. GlobalProtect is version 6.0.1-19.

[BPry]

@richferrara,

This isn't a terribly uncommon problem with GlobalProtect upgrades being pushed out from the firewall instead of installing through something like SCCM/Intune. Every time I push out an update I can expect a couple people to run into this issue, usually because they restart during the upgrade when the connection drops or they have something installed on their network which prevents GlobalProtect from downloading the update properly. 

If this keeps happening to you I'd be looking at the machine for anything that stands out as abnormal from a functionally upgrading client and making you connect to a different network for the upgrade to rule out local variables. Assuming that everyone else is working correctly it's unlikely to be a policy, but checking the logs on their end would also be a good idea. 

I think one of the reasons that you're having such an issue with this however likely has to do with the fact that your version is reporting as 6.0.1. That's extremely outdated at this point, and I have to image that what IT is re-installing on your machine is automatically attempting to update whenever it hits the firewall. They should just be deploying what they have activated on the firewall to you so you at least don't have to deal with this until they push the next update.