This is an intermittent issue. But I don't know how to solve it.
I use ProtonVPN to connect through my Wifi from the app on my laptop.
I have the Bluetooth setting to OFF.
Sometimes, Bluetooth turns on for no apparent reason.
I’ve observed previously that Wifi and Bluetooth do not work well together in some situations.
That’s my opinion.
Anyway, when I find that my Wifi through ProtonVPN self disconnects and tries to reconnect, it fails. and I discover that Bluetooth is On! It’s necessary for me to Exit ProtonVPN, clear the cache and config of the Proton folder, exit the browser (FF) and restart my laptop.
Once rebooted, I redo the settings for ProtonVPN and confirm that the Laptop settings show that Bluetooth is OFF.
Then I connect to Wifi through ProtonVPN, restore the Kill Switch and other settings and everything is working properly.
I’ve examined the Bluetooth files: main.conf, input.conf and network.conf,
but I really don’t want to mess with any of those files because I don’t see anything I could change in any of them.
** I do not expect advice re: ProtonVPN in this forum…unless someone has knowledge of the “relationship” between Wifi and ProtonVPN.
I appreciate your advice.
Thank you Jeremy. I will try it. BTW…I neglected to include that I use an external mouse (old habits die hard ) which uses a USB dongle.
I just never got in the habit of using the touchpad.
I assume it connects through Bluetooth. Maybe that’s the reason it’s intermittent.
I will try your suggestion anyway.
Thanks again.
Shobuz99
Ah yes…okay. Well I ran the "power off" > bluetoothctlin terminal and it hasn’t reoccurred since, so I’ll call that a fix.
Thanks for your help…
Shobuz99
cc @Jeremy31
I still have the problem.
This time Bluetooth came on again while I was away from my laptop.
When I came in to get on it, the WIFI was disconnected.
I tried restarting Proton VPN and it “timed out” and wouldn’t connect and Bluetooth was On!
I tried using the echo “power off” > bluetoothctl`in terminal.
It said "permission denied ".
Tried it once more and still It said “permission denied access”.
Then I tried sudo echo “power off” > bluetoothctl
It STILL said "permission denied "!!
So I Powered off/restarted.
Once it finished boot, I ran two commands to clear the Proton config & cache.
Next, I started Proton VPN and it connected.
Then I selected a specific server.
After all that I tried sudo echo “power off” bluetoothctl
It worked…
So…I’m perplexed at why Bluetooth still comes on by itself, while the Wifi is connected??
Anyone have any suggestions?
thanks for your continued help!
Shobuz99
Thanks again Jeremy.
I ran the echo "blacklist bluetooth"| sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/bluetooth.conf
It didn’t fail and I didn’t get any errors.
I assume this will end the issue for me. But I’d rather leave this open for a bit, and see if there are any other issues associated with this one from anyone else.
(Am I allowed to keep this incident open for a few days, @Rubi1200 ??)
Thank you all again, for your help.
So far, so good. Thank you for your involvement.
I respect all those who help keep this site going for us “antique geeks” of Ubuntu-Linux appreciation and long term use.
I’ve been with Ubuntu since 2006 (the old days!) and yet I continue to learn new things once I’m confronted with an issue or challenge that I haven’t had previously.
I upgrade on a longer timeline than many.
I went from 10.04 LTS to 14.04 LTS and skipped quite a few changes that I could’ve learned from…but I just didn’t feel as though I needed to.
The same is true again, when I went from 14.04 LTS to 18.04.
I did try 16.04 but I didn’t like it at all and now I don’t even recall why…
I went from 18.04 to 20.04 and discovered that I wanted to get off 20.04 because support would be lost soon.
Now that I’m at 22.04 LTS, and using a new laptop, I am thinking of going to 24.04 LTS. before September…
Sorry for the ramble…
Thank you again for your help.
Shobuz99
UPDATE: 06252025
This is STILL happening and worse, when Bluetooth comes on by itself, it shows multiple connections from servers and/or accounts I DID NOT Invite to connect!!!
Here’s a screenshot I took just now:
It does not show any established connections, just devices around you that advertise themselves … similar to how you will see wlans of your neighbors in the list … the “Not set up” should tell you there is no active connection here currently
your device should be having the ID 0bda:b85d which according to the linux hardware database http://files.atlanty.ru/?id=usb:0bda-b85d uses the btusb driver, so generally blacklisting bluetooth like you did above is likely not enough, you might want to blacklist btusb instead to have it turned off at a lower level.
Thank you orga.
I had no idea about the ID 0bda:b85d and its function.
Thank you for clearing up my suspicion that the Bluetooth list of advertised devices were not a real a problem.
Now that I know that, AND that I can blacklist btusb and have it turned off at a lower level, I will feel better about the whole Bluetooth interruption.
The bottom line for me is, that I’ve troubleshot one of my friend’s laptops for a problem of not connecting to his local printer via his Wifi and discovered that turning Off Bluetooth (on both ends- laptop & printer) when trying to connect to a wifi printer solved his problem.
This is what drove me to think that when I lost my wifi connection, it was because Bluetooth was On.
So, Can I assume the syntax for the command to blacklist btusbwould be: sudo blacklist ID 0bda:b85d ?
I won’t try this until you confirm that as correct, okay?
Thanks again for the clarifications!
no, you would use what @Jeremy31 told you in the post above but replace “blacklist bluetooth” with “blacklist btusb” in the command, that would block the actual device driver from loading (“bluetooth” is a higher level driver for protocol support, not actually something a device uses itself)
Okay, just to confirm, the command in terminal should be: echo “blacklist btusb”| sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/bluetooth.conf
Correct?
Thank you again for your help. Appreciate it.
) which uses a USB dongle.
