This kind of thing makes me want to use a 'dumbphone' as my daily driver..
Issue dialing 911 on Google Pixel 6 cell phones
51–60 of 265 posts
Re: Issue dialing 911 on Google Pixel 6 cell phones
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not a network problem. It's a side effect of that Android version letting apps register to take over calling functions (for, e.g., VOIP purposes), when then makes emergency calls fail if any of the apps that have registered that functionality don't handle it properly.
Do you mean users install apps that are buggy, and this is somehow Androids fault? At the same time, if Android wouldn't allow VoIP apps, it would be somehow at fault again ?
There is no reasonable way a normal user could suspect that buying a phone from one of the biggest companies in the world (Google) and installing a very common application from another huge company (Microsoft) will result in their phone no longer being able to dial the emergency number.
This is most definitely Google's fault for allowing emergency calls to be overridden and not having a fallback if the override fails.
Re: Issue dialing 911 on Google Pixel 6 cell phones
#53Let's just spell it out instead of this clickbait title: Dialing the local emergency number (112, 000, and 911 were reported, but presumably also others) sometimes doesn't work, just gives a click instead of dialing. Google blames third party apps. Users report similar issues since Pixel 4 that were reported to Google but haven't been resolved since release. Not like "911 doesn't ring" is much longer of a title than…
Google blames third party apps.
I'm not going to suggest third parties can't screw with a phone and make it effectively unusable, but why isn't emergency calling a separate code path in the dialler app and OS that just ignores everything that third parties have done? It should be impossible to change the behaviour of that small bit of the phone. Don't fire any OS level events, don't call any callbacks, ignore any registered intents.
This is on a Pixel. Google can have complete control of the OS and dialler if they want to. They should be able to effectively isolate this from the rest of the phone. Blaming third parties doesn't really explain it.
Re: Issue dialing 911 on Google Pixel 6 cell phones
#54Are there reports of similar problems outside of the US, e.g. dialling 999 in the UK from a pixel phone?
Re: Issue dialing 911 on Google Pixel 6 cell phones
#55When I used to work for a large mobile network, we would spend ages testing the firmware of new devices. Even giants (at the time) like Nokia would release phones which couldn't dial the emergency services, or put out more than the legal limit of radiation, or were in other ways defective. We'd test, send a report back, wait a few weeks, get a new firmware, test again, repeat until everything worked. It took months.…
This was one of my first jobs at Blackberry. It was considered the utmost priority for a call to 911 to be clear enough for the other side to hear that you are an employee at a testing facility verifying that the device does work and the other person can hear you and NOT dispatch emergency services.... Cops/EMTs show up, your firmware is junk.
How often did they show up, and who paid the fine?
Re: Issue dialing 911 on Google Pixel 6 cell phones
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
The way I see it, this just moves the responsibility for safety to the manufacturers instead of the network. It's on the specific company then to provide adequate QA for their firmware before they release updates, or it reflects badly on them. This fiasco for example, tells me to never buy a Google phone since they apparently don't test their devices properly. I'm not sure why it would be on the network to test devic…
Most people buy their phone from a network provider / carrier. And when someone goes wrong, customers complain to the network - not the manufacturer. That's why networks test firmware. Because they face the complaints and chargebacks when the phone breaks. Mobile networks are, in effect, private networks. Your employer may prohibit certain devices from connecting to their in-office LAN. Or they may insist on specific…
Perhaps staying inside the network is more common in the US, but from a European perspective it's unlikely for a device to stay at one provider at all times. Half the time you're roaming at another network due to missing towers or if you drive 100km and end up in a different country you won't see your original provider at all until you return.
As such, all networks must support all devices for the system to retain some shred of functionality and standardisation is key. Providers can't just pick and choose what to support if they want to maintain credibility. I would imagine it makes far more sense for some international org to do reviews, but at the absence of that the manufacturers themselves need to guarantee compatibility or they will be pushed out of the market by those that do.
Re: Issue dialing 911 on Google Pixel 6 cell phones
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
How would you have tested 911 dialling? Did you go all the way to a real operator?
Yes. From memory we had a specific SIM which was registered with 999. We dialled up, gave a password of the day, and asked them what info they could see about the call. They could see IMSI, IMEI, Cell Location and other things like that. (A couple of decade ago now - my memory might be inaccurate.)
Not a lot has changed.
You call the regional center (the 911, or in our case, 112 responders), you negotiate a timeframe for your tests (so that there's enough operators there), you tell them the phone number (and other data) that will be used for testing (because the responders get the approximate location of the caller, and might still send someone to check after a call, even if the voice doesn't get through), and then call 911 (112 here) a bunch of times.
Also, emergency calls have to work even without a sim card inserted, or with a simcard but still locked (via sim pin), or with an unlocked sim but locked screen, so that had to be tested too.
Re: Issue dialing 911 on Google Pixel 6 cell phones
#58Again?! This is, like, the third or fourth time I’ve heard of Pixels not being able to call emergency services.
Pretty sure it's the same old issue and people just haven't updated.
Re: Issue dialing 911 on Google Pixel 6 cell phones
#59Is there any theory or explanation why this happens? "Third party apps" is totally vague, what third party app could stop you from dialing an emergency number? And even if such apps exist (or even are common) is it not a huge design flaw by itself, which the manufacturer has to remedy?
Not sure why they don't say it by name but the bug was originally found with MS Teams. "The issue is the result of an “unintended interaction” between Teams and Android, specifically when the users have the app installed but are not logged in to any account." [0] [0] https://www.androidauthority.com/google-pixel-microsoft-team...
Wouldn't this be an easy fix? Just have any emergency number dialed automatically kill all 3rd party apps before sending the call.
Re: Issue dialing 911 on Google Pixel 6 cell phones
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
So users who join Teams calls but refuse to login cannot call 911, and die. Seems in line with the general Teams ethos to be honest.
Unless Teams is abusing private APIs or acting in other nefarious ways, this is 1000% a problem with Android itself. It shouldn’t be possible to break emergency service call operation through normal usage (or even naive usage) of the public APIs on the system. To blame Teams here is completely backwards.
Of course this is an Android issue, but it's also extremely typical of Teams to be an ill-behaved app.