Android - java.lang.SecurityException: Permission Denial: starting Intent

Question

I have a library (jar) on build path of my project. The project accesses the MainActivity in the jar, using the following intent:

final Intent it = new Intent();
it.setClassName("com.example.lib", "com.example.lib.MainActivity");
startActivity(it);

It used to work for sometime, but suddenly started getting 'ActivityNotFoundException: No Activity found to handle Intent' which I was able to resolve. But now I am stuck with a 'java.lang.SecurityException: Permission Denial: starting Intent'.

I have tried all suggestions made on stackoverflow (check for duplicates in manifest file; add android:exported="true" to lib manifest; Eclipse> Project> Clean; adding/ modifying 'intent-filter' tags; etc.). I even tried re-writing the manifest of the project but not going anywhere with it.

Here's the logcat output:

11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626): FATAL EXCEPTION: main
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626): java.lang.SecurityException: Permission     Denial: starting Intent { cmp=com.example.lib/.MainActivity } from ProcessRecord{40dd3778     4626:com.example.project/u0a10046} (pid=4626, uid=10046) not exported from uid 10047
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.os.Parcel.readException(Parcel.java:1425)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.os.Parcel.readException(Parcel.java:1379)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.app.ActivityManagerProxy.startActivity(ActivityManagerNative.java:1885)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.app.Instrumentation.execStartActivity(Instrumentation.java:1412)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.app.Activity.startActivityForResult(Activity.java:3370)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.app.Activity.startActivityForResult(Activity.java:3331)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.support.v4.app.FragmentActivity.startActivityForResult(FragmentActivity.java:824)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.app.Activity.startActivity(Activity.java:3566)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.app.Activity.startActivity(Activity.java:3534)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at com.example.project.MainActivity.onOptionsItemSelected(MainActivity.java:93)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.app.Activity.onMenuItemSelected(Activity.java:2548)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.support.v4.app.FragmentActivity.onMenuItemSelected(FragmentActivity.java:366)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at com.android.internal.policy.impl.PhoneWindow.onMenuItemSelected(PhoneWindow.java:980)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at com.android.internal.view.menu.MenuBuilder.dispatchMenuItemSelected(MenuBuilder.java:735)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at com.android.internal.view.menu.MenuItemImpl.invoke(MenuItemImpl.java:149)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at com.android.internal.view.menu.MenuBuilder.performItemAction(MenuBuilder.java:874)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at com.android.internal.view.menu.ActionMenuView.invokeItem(ActionMenuView.java:547)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at com.android.internal.view.menu.ActionMenuItemView.onClick(ActionMenuItemView.java:115)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.view.View.performClick(View.java:4204)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.view.View$PerformClick.run(View.java:17355)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.os.Handler.handleCallback(Handler.java:725)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:92)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:137)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at android.app.ActivityThread.main(ActivityThread.java:5041)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at java.lang.reflect.Method.invokeNative(Native Method)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:511)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit$MethodAndArgsCaller.run(ZygoteInit.java:793) 
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main(ZygoteInit.java:560)
11-07 06:20:52.176: E/AndroidRuntime(4626):     at dalvik.system.NativeStart.main(Native Method)

Manifest XML of Project:

<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
package="com.example.project"
android:versionCode="4"
android:versionName="4.0" >

<!-- Permissions -->
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE" />
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.INTERNET" />
<supports-screens android:anyDensity="true" />

<!-- SDK Settings -->
<uses-sdk
    android:minSdkVersion="11"
    android:targetSdkVersion="18" />

<!-- APP Start -->
<application
    android:allowBackup="true"
    android:icon="@drawable/ic_launcher"
    android:label="@string/app_name"
    android:theme="@style/AppTheme" >

<!-- App Activity -->
    <activity
        android:name="com.example.project.MainActivity"
        android:label="@string/app_name"
        android:screenOrientation="portrait" >
        <intent-filter>
            <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
            <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
        </intent-filter>
    </activity>

<!-- Library Activity -->
    <activity android:name="com.example.lib.MainActivity" android:label="LibMain">
         <intent-filter>
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN"></action>
     </intent-filter>
    </activity>

</application>
<!-- END - APP -->

</manifest>

What am I overlooking? Any suggestions?

EDIT

I updated the manifest.xml with all other activities & somehow, that resolved the problem. The intent activity starts up without any errors. BUT, this is only on AVD. On actual device, it is still throwing same error. I have uninstalled the app from device completely and reinstalled, yet the same error.

Fao

Also tried: project> Java Build Path> Order and Export> put tick on the jar file> Project Clean - Same error while opening the intent. – Fao

https://mcmap.net/q/182869/-android-java-lang-securityexception-permission-denial-start-intent can help here – Interconnect

Answer 1

You need to set android:exported="true" in your AndroidManifest.xml file where you declare this Activity:

<activity
    android:name="com.example.lib.MainActivity"
    android:label="LibMain" 
    android:exported="true">
    <intent-filter>
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" >
        </action>
    </intent-filter>
</activity>

Twiddle

Tried this. I added android:exported="true" in the project manifest.xml file under <activity android:name="com.example.lib.MainActivity". Gives me the same error. – Fao

remove intent-filter and try again. – Twiddle

Activity in Manifest now loks like this: <activity "com.example.lib.MainActivity" android:label="LibMain" android:exported="true"> </activity> Still same error – Fao

try it.setComponent(new ComponentName("com.example.lib", "com.example.lib.MainActivity"));instead of it.setClassName – Twiddle

it.setComponent(new ComponentName("com.example.lib", "com.example.lib.MainActivity")); -- Same Error. – Fao

last try. If you are using jar and it is on your build path then your MainActivity in jar file will run in your app process. So you can try with final Intent it = new Intent(this, com.example.lib.MainActivity); startActivity(it); – Twiddle

..new Intent(this, com.example.lib.MainActivity); did not help either. I made some changes to manifest.xml and it started working on AVD, but on a device it still throws the same 'SecurityException: Permission Denial' error. I have done multiple uninstall/ re-installs with no luck. Not sure why it would work on AVD and not on a device. – Fao

Activities are automatically exported if they contain an intent filter, so you would not not need to set that explicitly as long as you leave the intent filter in. – Newscast

That works for me. When I use AVD, I don't need to set the exported=true, but when I use real device, it will throw out the SecurityException. – Brynn

android:exported="true" solved the problem for me too – Rawson

exporting your activity means it can be exposed to other apps. Beware of doing this. Instead, try to generify your intents – Reproduction

how can we avoid this when executing with Appium? – Dispersoid

In my case, it looks like it might be device related. I have an LGL322DL/Android 10 and the app works fine but on my Samsung SM-S727VL Android 6.0.1 i get an exception "java.lang.SecurityException: Permission Denial: starting Intent...(pid=27545, uid=10185) not exported from uid 1001". I do have android:exported="true". The old LGE running Android 4.4 can't find the app I want to start but no exception. – Dingy

Answer 2

This is only for android studio

So I ran into this problem recently. The issue was in the build/run configuration. Apparently android studio had chosen an activity in my project as the launch activity thus disregarding my choice in the manifest file.

Click on the module name just to the left of the run button and click on "Edit configurations..." Now make sure "Launch default Activity" is selected.

The funny thing when I got this error was that I could still launch the app with from the device and it starts with the preferred Activity. But launching from the IDE seemed impossible.

Interphone

thnx brother...it worked...sometime small problems became big...but i learnt something called android:export = true..thnx – Allegory

Gah, I ran into this too (after the cat had been sleeping on the keyboard). Took forever to track down the issue. The cat was easy to track down though. – Introit

Answer 3

Select your proper configuration for launching Application.

In my case i found mistake as below image:

I had just changed like:

May it will help to someone, Thanks :)

Woodman

Answer 4

Add android:exported="true" in your 'com.example.lib.MainActivity' activity tag.

From the android:exported documentation,

android:exported Whether or not the activity can be launched by components of other applications — "true" if it can be, and "false" if not. If "false", the activity can be launched only by components of the same application or applications with the same user ID.

From your logcat output, clearly a mismatch in uid is causing the issue. So adding the android:exported="true" should do the trick.

Nelia

Answer 5

I was facing this issue on a react-native project and it came after adding a splash screen activity and making it the launcher activity.

This is the change i made in my android manifest XML file on the MainActivity configuration.

<activity
        android:name=".MainActivity"
        android:label="@string/app_name"
        android:configChanges="keyboard|keyboardHidden|orientation|screenSize"
        android:windowSoftInputMode="adjustResize"/>
      <activity android:name="com.facebook.react.devsupport.DevSettingsActivity" />

I added the android:exported=true and the activity configuration looked like this.

 <activity
        android:name=".MainActivity"
        android:exported="true"
        android:label="@string/app_name"
        android:configChanges="keyboard|keyboardHidden|orientation|screenSize"
        android:windowSoftInputMode="adjustResize"/>
      <activity android:name="com.facebook.react.devsupport.DevSettingsActivity" />
   

Illuminating

Answer 6

Similar to Olayinka's answer about the configuration file for ADT: I just had the same issue on IntelliJ's IdeaU v14.

I'm working through a tutorial that had me change the starting activity from MyActivity to MyListActivity (Which is a list of MyActivity). I started getting Permissions Denial.

After much trial, toil and pain: In .idea\workspace.xml:

...
<configuration default="false" name="MyApp" type="AndroidRunConfigurationType" factoryName="Android Application">
    <module name="MyApp" />
    <option name="ACTIVITY_CLASS" value="com.domain.MyApp.MyActivity" />
    ...
</configuration>
...

I changed the MyActivity to MyListActivity, reloaded the project and I'm off to a rolling start again.

Not sure which IDE you are using, but maybe your IDE is overriding or forcing a specific starting activity?

Flatfooted

Answer 7

android:exported="true" this line add in your first opening activity

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
    <manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
        xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
        package="org.triad.hp">
    
        <uses-permission
            android:name="android.permission.WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE"
            android:required="false"   tools:node="remove" />
        <uses-permission
            android:name="android.permission.READ_EXTERNAL_STORAGE"
            android:required="false" tools:node="remove" />
        <uses-permission
            android:name="android.permission.READ_SMS"
            android:required="false" tools:node="remove" />
        <uses-permission
            android:name="android.permission.RECEIVE_SMS"
            android:required="false" tools:node="remove" />
    
        <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.INTERNET"/>
    
        <uses-permission android:name="com.hp.kiosk.data.PERMISSION"/>
    
        <application
            android:hardwareAccelerated="true"
            android:usesCleartextTraffic="false"
            android:name=".App"
            android:configChanges="keyboard|keyboardHidden|screenSize|orientation"
            android:icon="@drawable/logo"
            android:allowBackup="false"
            android:label="@string/app_name"
            android:roundIcon="@drawable/logo"
            android:debuggable="false"
            android:theme="@style/AppTheme"
            tools:ignore="HardcodedDebugMode">
            <activity
                android:protectionLevel="signature"
                android:screenOrientation="landscape"
                android:configChanges="keyboard|keyboardHidden|screenSize|orientation"
                android:name=".activities.PaymentActivity"
                tools:ignore="LockedOrientationActivity"
                android:exported="true">
                <intent-filter>
                    <action android:name="org.triad.hp.activities.PaymentActivity" />
                     <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />
                </intent-filter>
            </activity>
    
            <activity
                android:screenOrientation="landscape"
                android:configChanges="keyboard|keyboardHidden|screenSize|orientation"
                android:name=".activities.MainActivity"
                tools:ignore="LockedOrientationActivity"
                android:exported="true">
                <intent-filter>
                    <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
                     <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
                </intent-filter>
            </activity>
    
            <activity
                android:exported="false"
                tools:replace="android:screenOrientation"
                android:screenOrientation="landscape"
                 android:configChanges="keyboard|keyboardHidden|screenSize|orientation"
                 android:name="com.paytm.pgsdk.PaytmPGActivity"
                tools:ignore="HardcodedDebugMode,LockedOrientationActivity" />
        </application>
    
    </manifest>

Acciaccatura

Answer 8

If you are trying to test your app coded in android studio through your android phone, its generally the issue of your phone. Just uncheck all the USB debugging options and toggle the developer options to OFF. Then restart your phone and switch the developer and USB debugging on. You are ready to go!

Ransack

Answer 9

In the case you are trying to open a webpage and you get the permission denial error with a crash. You need to make the intent browsable by adding.

intent.addCategory(Intent.CATEGORY_BROWSABLE)

Headed

Answer 10

In my case, this error was due to incorrect paths used to specify intents in my preferences xml file after I renamed the project. For instance, where I had:

<PreferenceScreen xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
    <Preference
        android:key="pref_edit_recipe_key"
        android:title="Add/Edit Recipe">
        <intent
            android:action="android.intent.action.VIEW"
            android:targetPackage="com.ssimon.olddirectory"
            android:targetClass="com.ssimon.olddirectory.RecipeEditActivity"/>
    </Preference>
</PreferenceScreen> 

I needed the following instead:

<PreferenceScreen xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
    <Preference
        android:key="pref_edit_recipe_key"
        android:title="Add/Edit Recipe">
        <intent
            android:action="android.intent.action.VIEW"
            android:targetPackage="com.ssimon.newdirectory"
            android:targetClass="com.ssimon.newdirectory.RecipeEditActivity"/>
</Preference>

Correcting the path names fixed the problem.

Encumbrance

To the person(s) who subtracted points: please explain what the issue is that led you to do that. My example worked in my case. This answer is quite old. If it's obsolete, I'll remove it. – Encumbrance

Answer 11

if we make the particular activity as

android:exported="true"

it will be the launching activity. Click on the module name just to the left of the run button and click on "Edit configurations..." Now make sure "Launch default Activity" is selected.

Todd

Answer 12

Another reason for this error would be that you have a debug and release version(or different flavors) installed on the same device/emulator. This might also explain the behavior some note here where they install through android studio or not and then have it work or not.

Giraudoux

Answer 13

<activity
        android:name=".MainActivity"
        android:label="@string/app_name"
        android:configChanges="keyboard|keyboardHidden|orientation|screenSize"
        android:windowSoftInputMode="adjustResize"/>
      <activity android:name="com.facebook.react.devsupport.DevSettingsActivity" />

<activity
        android:name=".MainActivity"
        android:label="@string/app_name"
        android:configChanges="keyboard|keyboardHidden|orientation|screenSize"
        android:windowSoftInputMode="adjustResize"/>
      <activity android:name="com.facebook.react.devsupport.DevSettingsActivity" />

Resonator

As it’s currently written, your answer is unclear. Please edit to add additional details that will help others understand how this addresses the question asked. You can find more information on how to write good answers in the help center. – Coil

Answer 14

AppActivity of any app which does not contain .SplashActivity at the end will throw this type of permisssion error. Make sure that AppActivity contain .SplashActivity at the end. If .SplashActivity is not present then it means app is not allowing for mobile automating

Wartburg

Hi. Welcome to StackOverflow. Could you please make it clearer what your question is? – Rubescent