Software Update: Viscosity 1.8.5

Viscosity is an OpenVPN client developed by SparkLabs for macOS and Windows systems. The program makes it easy to create, edit and manage VPN connections. The developers released version 1.8.5 for both macOS and Windows earlier this month. The corresponding announcement looks like this:

Viscosity For Mac & Windows: Version 1.8.5

Viscosity version 1.8.5 is now available for both macOS and Windows! This update is primarily a maintenance release to keep Viscosity and your VPN connections running smoothly.

In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, we’ve limited this update to bug fixes and small improvements only, with no major changes. We’ve received countless reports of Viscosity playing a widespread and vital role for businesses and educational institutions with staff working from home. In such an environment the last thing we want is for changes to Viscosity’s behavior or user interface to surprise users or add additional workload to already overburdened staff.

On the macOS side, this update resolves a number of rare crashes that have been reported to us, as well as an issue that could prevent custom menu item scripts in a bundled version of Viscosity from running. An issue where Full DNS wouldn’t be applied when using a split-routed TAP/bridged connection using DHCP for IP assignment has also been resolved.

The Windows version has a number of small improvements to both the DNS and networking to improve reliability, especially in certain enterprise setups. In particular, Viscosity is now better able to prevent loopback DNS settings remaining in rare situations caused by a Windows crash or surprise hardware removal. An issue where users may not get prompted for their U2F credentials on some Windows 10 machines has been resolved, as well as an issue that could cause VPN connections to fail to automatically reconnect.

We’re also aware of difficulty using the SafeNet Authentication Client (SAC) PKCS#11 driver with Viscosity 1.8.4 and earlier on macOS 10.15. The driver does not confirm to macOS 10.15’s dynamic library linking requirements, and so macOS blocks it from loading. We’ve been informed that updating to the latest version of the driver (10.2 Post GA R2) should resolve this. For those stuck on older versions of the driver, we’ve also managed to implement a workaround in Viscosity to allow the driver to load.

We’ve also received reports of two enterprise security software packages, namely “SentinelOne” and “Digital Guardian”, causing Viscosity to crash under macOS 10.15. Users have reported crashes when attempting to launch Viscosity, when attempting to connect a VPN connection, or when clicking on a password field. The fault lies with these software packages being incompatible with macOS 10.15’s “hardened runtime” requirement. The developers of both software packages have reported this has been fixed in their respective latest versions. If you are using a workplace-supplied device and are experiencing these crashes, please ask your IT staff to update the relevant software to the latest version.

Users with TAP connections upgrading to macOS 10.15.4 may also receive a “Legacy System Extension” warning from macOS, indicating that future versions of macOS may no longer support the TAP driver. Rest assured that we have already been working on a solution for the next major version of macOS.

Finally, this update also updates OpenSSL to version 1.1.1f for both platforms.

Version 1.8.5 Mac Release Notes:

• Workaround to allow the PKCS#11 driver for SafeNet tokens to load
• OpenSSL updated to version 1.1.1f
• Resolves issue with Full DNS mode on split-routed TAP connections using DHCP assignment
• Resolves issue that could prevent custom menu item scripts from running
• Resolves a rare potential crash when disconnecting a VPN connection
• Resolves a rare potential crash in Viscosity’s helper tool
• Various bug fixes and enhancements
• OS X 10.11 is no longer supported

Version 1.8.5 Windows Release Notes:

• Viscosity DNS now uses unique loopback IP addresses
• Network Profiles will now be cleaned up when a connection is removed
• Updates OpenSSL to version 1.1.1f
• Resolves an issue where U2F Windows Security dialog was not appearing on some machines
• Resolves an issue where automatic reconnections sometimes didn’t occur after a dropout
• Resolves an issue where Use Windows DNS option was sometimes not observed
• Resolves a rare issue that could cause some connection attempts to fail (build 1665)
• Various bug fixes and enhancements

The 1.8.5 update can be automatically installed from inside Viscosity, or downloaded and manually installed. For support with this version please visit our support section.