After recent automatic updates to Android, many users have experienced application crashes, for example, when recording video, a notification “com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox:search application is recording audio” constantly pops up, indicating that the camera cannot be used. When launching other programs (WhatsApp, Kate Mobile, Viber), a similar error appears, only with the interactor specified. We will tell you why this error occurs and how to fix it.
Reasons for the error
Error com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox:interactor is a system notification that appears due to automatically launched Google search options in Android. Actually, after the update a new mode appeared in "Okay Google", which enables the search option on the active screen of running programs.
Suppose you turn on a camera that has access to the microphone, at the same time “Okay, Google” also requests access to the microphone so that the user can voice control the camera - this is where a conflict and failure arises. The same thing happens when you launch instant messengers, Yandex.Navigator, Shazam and other applications.
Also, simple notifications “An error occurred in the application” are possible, which appear when there are no active applications. This is due to an attempt to connect to search services on the phone.
Removing the error
Fortunately, to remove such problems you do not need to perform factory resets or apply new firmware. Everything is removed in Google settings on Android. So, review and disable the following options:
So, the conflict error “The application com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox:interactor cannot be used” can be removed in the settings, or by removing the updates. Such conflicts are associated with dampness and beta tests of new versions, which, fortunately, are quickly corrected by the developers. If you have any difficulties with disabling or questions, write them down in the comments below, we will try to help.
Some Huawei smartphone users receive an error message every time they try to open the camera: “ The Camera app records audio. com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox:interactor cannot be used to record audio at this time." If you click OK, the error message will disappear, but will reappear after a few seconds. You can use the camera, but the intrusive message is, of course, very annoying. In addition, it prevents you from seeing what you are about to photograph.
Google says Quicksearchbox refers to a search box or Google Now. However, if there is no search window widget on the smartphone screen, and the owner of the device has never used the Google Now virtual assistant, it is difficult for him to understand how QuickSearchBox.apk interferes with the operation of the smartphone. And it’s even more impossible to track the connection between this system application and the camera.
This error is quite rare, but we still managed to find several solutions proposed by users on English-language forums. If you systematically see the message “The Camera application is recording audio on the screen of your smartphone when you try to launch the camera. At the moment, com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox:interactor cannot be used to record audio,” try using them to resolve the error. In any case, this is better than resetting the device to factory settings.
Method 1: Clear cache.
Quite often, smartphones are used with a full cache. Cleaning it from temporary system files can solve many problems.In particular, this operation is performed in Wipe Cache Partition(cleaning the cache partition where unnecessary temporary files are stored). You can get to the section by holding the key combination “Power on/off button + Volume up button” for 15 seconds with the device turned off. When the menu opens, scroll down to the “Wipe Cache Partition” entry using the Volume Down button. Select the found position by pressing the power button - this will start clearing the cache. It takes 1-2 seconds. A menu will appear again asking you to confirm the “Reboot system now” prompt by pressing the Power On/Off button. Ready.
If the problem persists, check if it appears after booting your smartphone into . If this is the case, then it is likely that one of the applications you have recently installed is preventing the camera from working correctly. You may have to uninstall apps one by one until the problem goes away in search of the culprit.
Method 2: Disable "OK Google" voice control.
While searching for a solution to the problem, we found out that the setting “ OK Google on any screen”, that is, the ability to get to Google from any screen by saying the command “OK Google” means constantly turning on the microphone. This appears to be causing the error "The Camera app is recording audio. com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox:interactor cannot be used to record audio at this time" as well as a host of issues in other apps.Go to "Settings" -> "Google" panel -> "Search" (Select "Voice Search") -> "OK Google Recognition". Disable the option that says you can access Google from any screen.
Method 3: Disabling voice calls to subscribers.
Disabling the voice calling function can also help solve the problem. To do this, go to "Settings" -> "Voice control" -> "Short call" -> disable the function.The Huawei P9 user who proposed this option reported that the error occurred after updating the OS from Android 4.0.1 to and suggested that a voice call and “OK Google” simultaneously keep the microphone in a ready state, and connecting a third option (camera) is no longer possible for the smartphone . Therefore, by disabling any of the first two, you don’t have to worry about an error appearing.
Method 4: Block Google apps from accessing your microphone
Unfortunately, method 3 does not help everyone - sometimes the problem returns, but the user still has to say goodbye to “OK Google”. If you're not too attached to "OK Google" and rarely use Quick Voice, it's easier to opt out entirely in Google apps access to the microphone. (“Settings” -> “Applications” -> “App permissions” -> use the slider to disable microphone access to Google applications).If these or other methods helped you fix the error “The Camera application is recording audio. com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox:interactor cannot be used to record audio at this time,” please share your experience in the comments.
Many Huawei device users encounter the “Camera application is recording audio” error when turning on the camera. At the same time, the error notification makes it very difficult to take pictures with the camera.
The full text of the error looks like this: “The Camera application is recording audio. com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox:interactor cannot be used to record audio at this time." After closing the error notification, it appears again.
How to get rid of the “Camera app is recording audio” error
1) Disable “OK Google” recognition on any screen.
As you know, the phrase “Ok Google” launches voice search and allows you to perform various actions on the device, for example, you can turn Bluetooth on or off using your voice, and so on. If you have the Google app settings enabled to recognize "OK Google" on any screen, this causes your device's microphone to be active all the time. In addition to the fact that enabling this function can lead to increased battery consumption, on Huawei devices it causes an error to appear when working with the camera. Therefore, this function should be disabled. For this:
1) open the application "Google" and pressing the button "Menu" select "Settings";
3) disable the function "On any screen".
If for some reason the first method did not help you and the “Camera app is recording audio” error still appears, you can do something else. On the Android OS, there are permissions that give the application the right to perform certain functions on the device. Most likely, the error will disappear if you prevent Google applications from using your device's microphone. However, in this case, you will not be able to use voice control. To block Google apps from accessing your microphone:
1) go to "Settings" and select a section "Applications";
2) click "Application Permissions" and select "Google";
3) in the item click "Prohibit".
The application randomly turns on the microphone and records everything that happens within earshot of the phone into a hidden file. Yandex explained this as an error and has already carried out an update.
On Tuesday, September 8, Facebook user Evgeniy Strokin published a post, in which he talked about the spyware he discovered on his phone. According to Evgeniy, an IT employee at Mars, the Yandex.Navigator application is spying: it turns on the microphone itself and records everything in a huge hidden audio file. He discovered the same problem on his tablet.
“Today the phone issued a warning that there was little memory left on the SD card. I was very surprised and went to check. It turned out that at the root there is a certain file stream.wav, into which information is being actively written. I listened and it turned out that all the events, conversations, negotiations over the last 2 days were recorded from the microphone. I checked the tablet - the same crap. Because I have a tablet under CyanogenMod and root, quickly I found the reason (see screenshot). It turned out that the Yandex.Navigator application was spying.”
In the comments, it turned out that another user, Alexander Shutko, encountered the same problem the day before.
“It eats up the battery even when I don’t use Android 5.1. I started to figure out why the battery drains quickly. I started with application rights. RemovedThe navigator has rights to record sound from a microphone and discovered that a notification about refusal to record sound constantly pops up, even though I don’t use it and haven’t even launched it! The processor is constantly twitching by some navigator process. Why is this? Is this cartography or spyware?
Evgeny Strokin later reported that after the update the application stopped writing “ether”. He plans to monitor the traffic for some time to see if the audio recording will be transmitted somewhere further. He is also going to talk to a lawyer.
Ukrainian users of the Yandex application installed on an Android phone wrote about the same thing on the Autoua.net forum on Monday.
“The latest update of Yandex navigator began writing stream.wav file in the background from the phone microphone to different folders.”
The Yandex company explained what happened: it turns out that this is an error in the code of the updated Yandex.Navigator.
“Due to a bug in the code of the updated Yandex.Navigator for Android, the application recorded sound data and saved it in the phone’s memory. This data was not sent anywhere; only the owner of the smartphone had access to it. Yesterday, as soon as we discovered this error, we immediately stopped distributing this version of the application and rolled out an update. Now, when working with voice activation, no data is recorded or saved, and “extra” files are deleted from memory. If your device does not have automatic application updates enabled, you need to download the latest version from Google Play. We apologize to users."
The application from Yandex is used by many residents of Russia. The motorist caste was no exception. This program, by the way, has always shown itself to be excellent and has gained the respect and unshakable trust of many smartphone users. Despite this, a number of developer errors that provoked extremely unpleasant phenomena “tarnished” the credibility of Yandex Navigator.
In particular, such a defect was an error in the program code, which provoked the constant recording of ambient sounds in one of the local application folders. Noticing something was wrong, many Yandex navigation users sounded the alarm, wanting to quickly find out the cause of the problem. What they did, we’ll talk about this and more in more detail in the article below.
A few words about Yandex Navigator
Before looking at application errors, let's get acquainted with what it is in principle. In general, Yandex Navigator is a completely proprietary navigation program from the manufacturer of the same name. This application was built on the basis of Yandex Maps, but was also significantly modified. The main difference between Navigator and Maps is that the first program has a more navigational bias than the second.
Thus it turns out that Yandex Navigator is a full-fledged application, the use of which is aimed at obtaining high-quality navigation service. The main functions of the program are:
- showing the user a map of his place of stay and other territories where he wants to route;
- formation of the best and fastest route in a given direction;
- providing voice assistance to the driver of a car while driving along a given route;
- providing the user with all the information about the presence of traffic jams in the places where he is staying and, in general, about the traffic situation there.
Today, Yandex Navigator is a free application with the possibility of purchasing additional functions for money. The program manufacturer quite often releases various updates that help correct existing errors in the application and add something better to it that it did not have before.
Important! Yandex Navigator has exclusively original program codes that form an unchanging and completely individual navigation concept. Largely because of this, this application is one of the most used in Russia and the CIS countries.
Why does the program record audio?
“Yandex Navigator is recording audio!!!” — with such a sensational statement in September 2015, a user of the social network Facebook, Evgeniy Strokin, excited the public. By the way, this news was not a “yellow duck”, but the real truth. Why did this happen, what events are behind it? Let's figure it out.
Let us note right away that there is no espionage in the fact that the Yandex Navigator application records audio. A similar phenomenon was caused in one of the program versions, updated as of September 2015, by an ordinary software error. More precisely, the culprit was an error debugger that was not removed by programmers, recording user audio commands in a separate system folder. A similar debugger was created so that program producers could test and correct the sound commands sent by the user to the application in a more convenient mode. In the final version of the update dated September 5, 2015, this debugger should have been removed, but Yandex programmers simply forgot to do this. The culmination of everything was the release of the “spyware” into the world and its downloading by hundreds of thousands of users... A serious and rather stupid mistake by such a reputable company, isn’t it?
Many will ask the question: “How did the user of the program notice the error?” Everything here is extremely simple. The fact is that the audio recording error in Yandex Navigator had one distinct feature, or rather, the resulting audio file was recorded in a separate system folder and was not deleted, but simply clogged the memory. As a result, users, a couple of hours after turning it on, discovered that the memory of their device had disappeared somewhere, or rather, it had become busy with something. The first to reveal that the problem was in Yandex Navigator was the previously mentioned Evgeniy Strokin, who sounded the alarm about dishonesty and possible espionage on the part of the application. Fortunately, the error in the program did not carry any malicious intent. Many checks of the erroneous version of the program and statements from Yandex itself confirmed that The navigator did not send the recorded audio data anywhere, but simply stored it on the device. Whether to trust applications from Yandex after this is something everyone will decide for themselves.
Other Yandex Navigator errors
As noted earlier, Yandex Navigator is often corrected by the manufacturer if there are some errors in the application. If the audio recording phenomenon was a one-time occurrence and was quickly corrected, then some program errors do not appear so rarely. Which of these causes inconvenience to program users? Read below.
So, having analyzed all sorts of complaints about bugs in the work of Yandex Navigator, our resource identified three main errors and presented them with the following list:
- Mistake No. 1 - Forming and displaying a route that is not entirely correct. A similar bug in the application occurs with enviable regularity (not just once, as with audio). The essence of this error is that Yandex Navigator, analyzing the optimal path to a user-specified point and forming the route itself, chooses some incomprehensible paths. The “incomprehensibility” of these lies in the fact that, firstly, they are not the shortest and, secondly, extremely inconvenient for a motorist to travel through. Fortunately, if such an error occurs, it is corrected the very next day after it appears and can only seriously spoil the mood of the Yandex navigation user a couple of times.
- Error No. 2 - Presence of inaccurate information in the People's Card. This bug is systematic and can lead to real confusion for the user, but it will not be possible to get rid of it. The fact is that the People's Map in Yandex Navigator is formed by the users of the application themselves and requires careful moderation, but moderators are also ordinary people who do not always have time to notice the incorrect design of maps with the proper speed and correct the error in time. You can only deal with such a bug in the program.
- Error No. 3 - Incorrect display of the traffic situation. Here the situation is similar to the situation with the People's Card. Application moderators do not always have time to quickly track this or that traffic jam and enter it into the Navigator itself, and sometimes the rush in this matter leads to the fact that a traffic problem is indicated on a street where it actually does not exist and is not expected . Fortunately, this problem is infrequent and is corrected fairly quickly.
Otherwise, the Yandex Navigator application is a solid and well-made navigation program. No wonder the “army” of its users is huge in the post-Soviet space. We hope the material presented today was useful to you. Good luck on the roads!
Yandex Navigator review:
