How do I remove Cisco Umbrella VPN from my MacBook Air?

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Level 1

16 points

How do I remove Cisco Umbrella VPN from my MacBook Air?

Somewhere over the last 6 months I am blocked from certain websites and I never set this Cisco Umbrella app up on my MacBook Air. I know it has nothing to do with Apple as I have been on the phone and they questioned me about it. Possibly my isp? Obviously, this is a vpn that was blocked, but I am on a small island in the Caribbean and if I don't have one I get blocked from some U.S. and other sights that I need to access. Is there any way to get rid of this annoyance? I did not pursue it with the Apple rep I was speaking to because I had a much bigger problem, and that was what he was helping me with, but it has really become a nuisance that I would like to get rid of. This is my personal computer so my office did not install this and if it is on my computer I have no idea how to find it to remove it.

[Re-Titled by Moderator]

Original Title: How to

MacBook Air, macOS 26.1

Posted on Nov 15, 2025 1:30 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

medwds

Level 4

2,194 points

Nov 15, 2025 2:11 PM in response to islandlady91

I think what you're seeing here is OpenDNS, which is now owned by Cisco. They have a service called FamilyShield. It isn't a VPN or other app, it's a set of DNS servers you specify either on a client device, like your Mac, or on your router.

Check whether you've specified custom DNS servers on your Mac and, if so, delete them in order to use the defaults for your network.

If there are no custom DNS servers specified on your Mac, you may have set them on your router. If you let me know which router you have, I might be able to help you check that.

If you don't control your router, you can't fix that. But you might be able to override its DNS by specifying a DNS service of your choice on your Mac — see the same page linked above. Popular examples include:

Cloudflare: 1.1.1.1 and 1.0.0.1
Google: 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4
Quad9: 9.9.9.9 and 149.112.112.112

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Answer 2

islandlady91 Author

Level 1

16 points

Nov 15, 2025 2:49 PM in response to medwds

Thank you very much. This has been so frustrating and I have to say, I did change my dns quite a while ago but was advised to switch it back. So there were two numbers and when I tried one number everything worked normally again. So I took the other number out and hope I have the correct dns working now! I knew it had to be something pretty simple, but when I was using that other dns number I never had the block issues. Anyway, it is working and I am happy now, thank you.

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