diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index 36081e0..3061484 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@
     install_requires=[
         'riak==2.5.4',
         'python-dateutil>=1.5, != 2.0',
-        'protobuf==2.6.1',
+        'protobuf==3.18.3',
         'sqlalchemy==1.1.14',
         'MySQL-python==1.2.5',
         'six'