diff --git a/NEWS b/NEWS
index 533b46a18..62f6be58e 100644
--- a/NEWS
+++ b/NEWS
@@ -29,6 +29,8 @@ Notable changes included in this snapshot so far include:
   documentation. This represents a change in behavior since previous
   versions where the first character of the string was used as
   type. The internal client is not affected by the change.
+* DNS setting rc-manager=file now always follows dangling symlinks
+  instead of replacing /etc/resolv.conf with a plain file.
 
 The following features were backported to 1.10.x releases from 1.10.0 to
 1.10.8 are also present in NetworkManager-1.12:
diff --git a/man/NetworkManager.conf.xml b/man/NetworkManager.conf.xml
index 6f333acd6..8a1b04bc0 100644
--- a/man/NetworkManager.conf.xml
+++ b/man/NetworkManager.conf.xml
@@ -367,8 +367,10 @@ no-auto-default=*
         <para><literal>file</literal>: NetworkManager will write
         <filename>/etc/resolv.conf</filename> as file. If it finds
         a symlink to an existing target, it will follow the symlink and
-        update the target instead. If the symlink's target does not exist,
-        the symlink will be replaced by a file.</para>
+        update the target instead. In no case will an existing symlink
+        be replaced by a file. Note that older versions of NetworkManager
+        behaved differently and would replace dangling symlinks with a
+        plain file.</para>
         <para><literal>resolvconf</literal>: NetworkManager will run
         resolvconf to update the DNS configuration.</para>
         <para><literal>netconfig</literal>: NetworkManager will run
diff --git a/src/dns/nm-dns-manager.c b/src/dns/nm-dns-manager.c
index 354520b3a..a29fd81f4 100644
--- a/src/dns/nm-dns-manager.c
+++ b/src/dns/nm-dns-manager.c
@@ -792,18 +792,27 @@ update_resolv_conf (NMDnsManager *self,
 	if (   rc_manager == NM_DNS_MANAGER_RESOLV_CONF_MAN_FILE
 	    || (   rc_manager == NM_DNS_MANAGER_RESOLV_CONF_MAN_SYMLINK
 	        && !_read_link_cached (_PATH_RESCONF, &resconf_link_cached, &resconf_link))) {
+		gs_free char *rc_path_syml = NULL;
 		nm_auto_free char *rc_path_real = NULL;
 		const char *rc_path = _PATH_RESCONF;
 		GError *local = NULL;
 
 		if (rc_manager == NM_DNS_MANAGER_RESOLV_CONF_MAN_FILE) {
-			/* Note that if /etc/resolv.conf is a dangling symlink, realpath()
-			 * will return %NULL, and thus below we will replace the symlink
-			 * with a file. This is the only case, in which NetworkManager
-			 * replaces an existing symlink with a file.*/
-			rc_path_real = realpath (rc_path, NULL);
+			rc_path_real = realpath (_PATH_RESCONF, NULL);
 			if (rc_path_real)
 				rc_path = rc_path_real;
+			else {
+				/* realpath did not resolve a path-name. That either means,
+				 * _PATH_RESCONF:
+				 *   - does not exist
+				 *   - is a plain file
+				 *   - is a dangling symlink
+				 *
+				 * Handle the case, where it is a dangling symlink... */
+				rc_path_syml = nm_utils_read_link_absolute (_PATH_RESCONF, NULL);
+				if (rc_path_syml)
+					rc_path = rc_path_syml;
+			}
 		}
 
 		/* we first write to /etc/resolv.conf directly. If that fails,