v0.20.0 Fatal Error Report code = Internal desc = Internal error encountered

[AlexGurtoff]

What happened:

After upgrading ExternalDNS to v0.20.0, the controller began crashing with the following fatal error:

time="2025-11-24T04:22:34Z" level=info msg="All records are already up to date"
time="2025-11-24T04:22:35Z" level=info msg="All records are already up to date"
time="2025-11-24T04:22:37Z" level=fatal msg="Failed to do run once: rpc error: code = Internal desc = Internal error encountered."

The error appears even when there are no DNS changes required. The error occurs randomly. Over the last 3 days we observed around 10 restarts of the ExternalDNS pod, all caused by the same fatal RPC error.

What you expected to happen:

ExternalDNS should continue operating normally without fatal crashes, even when all records are up to date. No internal RPC error should be thrown.

How to reproduce it (as minimally and precisely as possible):

1. Upgrade ExternalDNS from a previous version to v0.20.0
2. Run ExternalDNS in "sync loop" mode (default)
3. Allow it to reach the state where all DNS records are already up to date
4. Observe frequent controller crashes with the RPC internal error above

Additional details:

• The error happens consistently after the upgrade.
• Nothing in our DNS provider configuration changed.
• Rolling back to v0.19.x removes the issue completely.

Environment:

• External-DNS version: v0.20.0
• DNS provider: GCP
• Kubernetes version: 1.33.5-gke.1162000
• Deployment method: bitnami helm chart
• Cloud: GKE
• Logs attached above