Hey 'stah, My ProTools LE uses iLok (developed by Pace technologies) but not a separate dongle as such. It's possible the "dongle" bit is included/integrated in/into the I/O interface hardware (Digidesign DIGI001) as up until recently ProTools only worked with the ProTools hardware which is/was expensive and the software was thrown in. The new versions of PT work with other I/O units but now you pay the big bucks for the software.
I've mostly never had any problems but back when I updated to the last version that supports my DIGI001 (PTLE 6.4) I had pace iLok issues and had to get an updated iLok file from them (Avid Digidesign) to fix it. IIRC I spent a whole weekend getting it to work (trawling through the support etc), iLok was one issue, there were others.
These things can be very hardware and opp system (OS) dependent and can also be affected by antivirus/malware programs, in the old days you plugged dongles into serial ports (hard to find on a modern device) so I suspect the newer versions are USB connected devices which now has multiple versions (1.0, 1.2, 2.0, 3.0 etc) and all monitored by your AV (on access scan). Also the PC and OS, 16bit (back then), then 32bit now 64bit. So upshot is you'd want to make sure it's all compatible with your system. Lack of support is not a good look.
(Is there another more reliable product out there that handles this?), (as in the dongle aspect?) if the software is tied to pace iLok (and it seems it is), there's no replacement alternative (that I'm aware of, although there may be cracked versions of the program (if it's any good I'm sure there will be but probably laced with malware in this day and age (sad but true)). The iLok dependance will probably be compiled into the program code/binaries.
So you may consider another program ?