Microsofts NCSI feature not working with Cisco Umbrella Roaming Clients

Question

Ticket: REG:116112114966237

Engineering Reference: RFC 10644351

Please include the following KBA: https://support.umbrella.com/hc/en-us/articles/230900948-Umbrella-Roaming-Client-Microsoft-Windows-Limited-Network-Connectivity-Warning-Yellow-Triangle-

Microsoft has acknowledged that the conflict with the Umbrella Roaming Client is a "design limitation" within their NCSI feature. They have confirmed that by default NCSI will not perform its necessary checks when using a DNS server running on 127.0.0.1:53. The explanation is that these DNS tests are being constrained to the network interface being tested, and the underlying Windows network stack blocks the DNS query from being routed to the loopback interface.

Unfortunately, this means that those DNS tests never actually arrive at the Umbrella Roaming client. Because of this, Windows will show all user pc's that have the Cisco Umbrella Roaming clients a big yellow triangle showing that Microsoft office apps have no connectivity when in reality, they do.

I am trying to find a fix for this issue... Had anybody ran into it before? Anybody know of any fixes?

Answer 1

Hello NickBrinkley

Microsoft released a fix in Windows 10 The setting is available in gpedit.msc within "Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Network > Network Connectivity Status Indicator". Enable the 'Specify Global DNS' then run GPUPDATE /FORCE

Or you can deploy via registry change:

reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\POLICIES\MICROSOFT\Windows\NetworkConnectivityStatusIndicator" /v UseGlobalDNS /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
(reboot needed)

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