Proton VPN won't start

General Help
1

I installed Proton VPN via the Proton repo following the instructions here:

The installed VPN version is 1.0.8, the latest. I'm running Zorin OS 17.3. When I try to start the VPN it's throwing the errors below. I don't know python, so I can't really decipher what the errors mean. Proton won't provide support for Zorin. Can anyone here help me figure out how to fix it? Thanks in advance.

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/usr/bin/protonvpn-app", line 33, in
sys.exit(load_entry_point('proton-vpn-gtk-app==4.9.7', 'console_scripts', 'protonvpn-app')())
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/vpn/app/gtk/main.py", line 35, in main
controller = Controller.get(executor, exception_handler)
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/vpn/app/gtk/controller.py", line 64, in get
executor.submit(controller.initialize_vpn_connector).result()
File "/usr/lib/python3.10/concurrent/futures/_base.py", line 458, in result
return self.__get_result()
File "/usr/lib/python3.10/concurrent/futures/_base.py", line 403, in __get_result
raise self._exception
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/vpn/app/gtk/controller.py", line 97, in initialize_vpn_connector
self._connector = await self._api.get_vpn_connector()
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/vpn/core/api.py", line 60, in get_vpn_connector
self._vpn_connector = await VPNConnector.get(
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/vpn/core/connection.py", line 94, in get
await connector.initialize_state()
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/vpn/core/connection.py", line 269, in initialize_state
state = await self._get_initial_state()
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/vpn/core/connection.py", line 257, in _get_initial_state
if self._session_holder.session.logged_in:
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/vpn/core/session_holder.py", line 80, in session
self._session = self._proton_sso.get_default_session(
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/sso/sso.py", line 201, in get_default_session
return self.get_session(account_name, override_class)
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/sso/sso.py", line 170, in get_session
session = override_class(self._appversion, self._user_agent)
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/vpn/session/session.py", line 78, in init
super().init(*args, **kwargs)
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/session/api.py", line 110, in init
self.transport_factory = None
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/session/api.py", line 535, in transport_factory
from .transports import TransportFactory
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/session/transports/init.py", line 20, in
from .aiohttp import AiohttpTransport
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/proton/session/transports/aiohttp.py", line 27, in
from OpenSSL import crypto
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/OpenSSL/init.py", line 8, in
from OpenSSL import crypto, SSL
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/OpenSSL/crypto.py", line 1579, in
class X509StoreFlags(object):
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/OpenSSL/crypto.py", line 1598, in X509StoreFlags
NOTIFY_POLICY = _lib.X509_V_FLAG_NOTIFY_POLICY
AttributeError: module 'lib' has no attribute 'X509_V_FLAG_NOTIFY_POLICY'. Did you mean: 'X509_V_FLAG_EXPLICIT_POLICY'?

2

This bit here means that one of the packages used by Proton VPN uses OpenSSL, but can't find one particular module.

Did you use pip or pip3 as per the instructions you linked to in the section A warning about using pip and PyPI?

If yes, try the following commands:

python3 -m pip install pip --upgrade
pip install pyopenssl --upgrade

If not, try this instead:

sudo apt install python3-openssl
3

In the Instructions stands:

Our app officially supports the latest stable Ubuntu LTS version running the GNOME desktop environment.

That would be Ubuntu 24.04 LTS. Zorin is based on Ubuntu 22.04 LTS. Maybe that could be a Point. But try @zenzen's Advice. When it help's all is good.

4

That worked! Thank you!

5

Thank you for your reply. ZenZen's suggestion worked. :blush:

2 Likes
6

Cool, glad that worked! For anyone else running into a similar issue, here’s a tip: try enabling Proton VPN Automatically Connect in the app’s settings so it starts up on boot. That often resolves cases where the VPN won’t launch or stays disabled after reboot.

7

A post was split to a new topic: Cannot open ProtonVPN