Flash blocks access to mic

Report · Apr 23, 2019

Hello,

I have been trying to allow my mic on Chrome for months, but it really does not work. Here is my problem:

On this website, I'm trying to use my mic. Here is what happens whenever I'm trying to use it (the message means "The authorization to use the mic was denied") :

Now, it is the same on facebook, and the same on any website in Safari. However,

1. I have activated my mic AND flash on the website (cf. pic)

2. I have downloaded the last version of Flash and it says that it's activated

3. My computer allows access to mic

4. I tried to go on Flash Settings, but no website appear on my list, and no authorization is asked when I try to use the mic.

What else can I try? Where does this problem come from? I haven't found any answer yet, despite looking for hours.

Report · Apr 24, 2019

If you haven't rebooted, I'd start there. My guess is that something else has the Microphone reserved, or it's in a bad state. Rebooting should resolve that.

Also, as far as I can tell, Dictanote isn't using Flash. See the Chrome Task Manager screenshot below. You should talk to Dictanote about the technical issue you're experiencing.

Report · Apr 24, 2019

Hi,

It has nothing to do with Dictate, as the mic does not work anywhere else on the internet. However, it works perfectly off-line (garage band, dictate on word or anything else really).

I have rebooted like 10 times, this problem has been going on for months now. I have even re-downloaded Flash.

Report · Apr 24, 2019

Agreed. What I'm saying is that it's not Flash. In the instance you provided, Flash isn't even in play -- the website is using the browser's native audio facilities, but it's not working.

Your microphone doesn't work in the browser. If it doesn't work in the browser, it's not going to be available to Flash.

I don't know why your microphone isn't available in the browser. You might try alternative browsers, to see if it's specific to Chrome, but what I can say with reasonable certainty is that looking at Flash for a solution isn't going to be helpful.

Report · Apr 24, 2019

I have tried it in other browsers, but still it does not work. Why would it be all of the browsers not working with my mic? In addition, it stopped working after I downloaded a more recent version of Flash, so it was directly linked with it.

Do you have any idea of a website using the mic through flash to see if it works?

Report · Apr 24, 2019

Who do you think I should talk to about this issue? Because it seems as that it's neither Chrome, nor my mic, and apparently not Flash.

Report · Apr 24, 2019

I just want to acknowledge that this problem is weird. I'm not sure what the deal is. Weird usually equals low-level, like maybe the microphone drivers are corrupt or something. I don't have enough information to diagnose it. If it's a third-party external microphone, you could try uninstalling it/reinstalling the drivers. If it's built into your laptop, the OEM should offer tech support.

Are you running something in the background that's keeping the microphone busy? When was the last time you ran a virus or malware scanner (I'm getting into really weird possibilities with that, but I'm wondering about whether there's something keeping the microphone busy that you *don't* know about.)

Anyway, Flash Player wouldn't just magically break the microphone. It's just not how it works architecturally. We don't have permission to do it. It's not like an audio cabling thing where we'd loop it in or something. We're (or in this case, the browser) is asking the operating system's audio subsystem for a handle to it. My sense is that's failing, but it's unclear why.

You don't have to take my word for the Flash involvement --- you could easily eliminate it as a potential cause by uninstalling.

Uninstall Flash Player - Windows:

https://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/uninstall-flash-player-windows.html

Uninstall Flash Player - Mac:

https://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/uninstall-flash-player-mac-os.html

If the problem goes away, then I'm super interested and want a bunch of diagnostics, but I can't imagine that it's going to work out that way. If the problem persists, then you're looking at something lower in the technology stack -- most likely drivers.

Report · Apr 24, 2019

Thanks for all of your answers. It's a built in mic, that used to work. I don't really understand either. I have run a virus scan yesterday to check, but it did not detect anything. I don't think that there is anything working in the background, I mean nothing is open.

I have just downloaded the last version of Firefox, and it seems to work on Firefox for some reason. My problem stil is that Dictanote does not work on anything but Chrome. That's a never ending problem!

I had tried to uninstall flash player, but it did not work, so I really can't figure what's happening. Maybe it could have something to do more with my computer than with anything else? Safari did ask for permission to use mic (which Chrome was not even doing), but I still could not use it after accepting.

I have seen a forum post with a similar problem, but no answer was provided. It's not such a big deal, but it seems really mysterious.

Report · Apr 24, 2019

here is a web page for microphone test

Microphone Test – in Adobe Flash | Online Mic Test

do you have other sound cards or audio inputs?

Jeromie, do you think a javascript/html5 script accessing to the audio input running in background can create an exclusive lock preventing

other web pages or Flash accessing to it?

Report · Apr 24, 2019

If you haven't, a fresh install of Chrome might not hurt. It may just be in a bad state or something. If you're signed into a Google account on Chrome, it will restore all of your settings and history when you sign back in, so it's not *too* painful.

One of the big changes to the web in general that's happened in the last year is that all the major browsers now enforce that in order to access the camera and microphone in a browser, everything on the page needs to be served over HTTPS. This ensures that people aren't sending video and audio streams over the network in way that anyone along the network path could intercept and watch them without also having to break the encryption. That's where a lot of the traffic on our forums about camera/mic not showing up are coming from. Flash can't even see the camera and microphone unless the browser exposes them to us, so like in Chrome's case, it actually makes the security decision first, and if it doesn't like the situation, Chrome tells Flash that there are no camera/mic devices present. It seems like a lot of content providers don't keep up (you'll see some frequent fliers if you look through the post history), and it's not clear to me why those problems are left to persist. I assume it's because there's not money/staff/interest in most of those cases.

It may be that in this particular instance, Firefox is more forgiving about some specific situation than Safari and Chrome are, or maybe you've accidentally set some global security preferences or those preferences are corrupted on disk or something (which takes us back to weird == low-level problems).