Unusual Behavior with the APP Since the Latest Firmware Update

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN

Every morning (since the latest firmware update 6.6.0_6060002 on 11/11/2025) when I go into the Arlo app and have done nothing but open the app, five of my eight cameras show an image that was just taken with "just now" in the upper left of the frame and three cameras show only a black image (with no "just now") although, if you tap the black image then those three show the last image taken but will revert back to the black image when you go back to "Dashboard" or "Devices". Note that when go to the app in the morning, the app is in "Arm Home" after being in "Standby" all night.

Three of the five cameras, which show the "just now" image, are active in "Arm Home" but two of the five are only active in "Arm Away" which happens when both phones are outside the geofencing zone and that was about two weeks ago.

Of my three cameras that are only active in "Arm Away" (one is black, two show the "just now" image) and when I tap the image to show the list of video clips, the two that have the "just now" image show 10 second "motion" video clips taken when I went into the app and the one with the black image shows the last video clip from two weeks prior, when in "Arm Away".

Two of the three that show the black image are cameras are active in "Standby" & "Arm Away" and when I tap on the black image they show, in the list, the last image taken during "Standby" and not the 10 second "motion" clip.

The three cameras that are active in "Arm Home" (also included an all modes) and show the image with "just now", taken when I first went into the app, do not show a 10 second "motion" video, with the time corresponding to the time I opened the app, in the list of video clips.

At the time I'm seeing all of this unexplained behavior, and I do nothing in the app (live stream, play video clips, etc.) then go to the web portal, everything in the web portal is as it should be unlike the app.

Logging out of the app and back in does nothing to resolve this and the three cameras that are in "Arm Home" will show the correct images when triggered by motion and continue to do so, and if I live stream the remaining five cameras (with the "just now" or black image) they will display the live stream image as the last one taken.

A few days ago, I decided to reinstall the app and thought all was well until the next morning when I went into the app and found the same issue.

[BrookeN]

Can you please update to 6.17 and let me know if the behavior you are seeing has been resolved. Thank you.

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN 

I should also note that of the five cameras that are not in "Arm Home", if I live stream them from the web portal the image shown afterwards in "Dashboard" and "Devices", does not appear in the app. Also, if I live stream any of those five cameras, from the app, they will now show the current image in "Dashboard" and "Devices" on both the app and web portal.

@BrookeN - Just in case you were wondering if the latest firmware solved either the "video playback stuttering/hesitation issue" or the "lights sending push notifications when notifications are set to off issue"...it did not. I was hoping there would have been at least one benefit that came out of this latest update 🙁

[BrookeN]

The NOW feature is expected behavior. 

There are three ways Timestamp and Thumbnail will be updated.. The "Now" timestamp is expected:

1. After hitting the play button to do Livestream
2. When motion is being detected
3. This was just recently implemented. Upon app re-launch, when the thumbnail is 8 hours or older, it will update the Timestamp to "Now" and the image/snapshot will be updated accordingly as well.

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN 

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@BrookeN wrote:

The NOW feature is expected behavior. 

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Thanks for that info, although it looks like there's some glitches that showed up with that "NOW" feature.

The first two screenshots are what the app looks like on "Dashboard" when I open it in the morning (it was taken 20 minutes after launch) and the frames that aren't black show that, at the time of launch 20 minutes earlier, they acquired an image upon launch. Note that there are three camera frames not shown in the pics that are in "Arm Home" and had been triggered by motion during that 20 minute period so I didn't include those...of the five screens shown the first two are included in "Standby" and all five (along with the first three that I didn't include) are included in "Arm Away".

The third and fourth screenshots (of the same frames) were taken an hour after opening the app (time stamp is the same in all) in the "Devices" screen and, as you can see, there are no longer black screens.

The fifth and sixth screenshots were taken after going back to the "Dashboard" screen from the "Devices" screen and, as you can see, three frames have reverted to black.

Note that when I click on a black frame it will successfully live stream but when you stop the live stream it goes back to a black frame.

Another thing is that if I live stream the first two cameras (Doorbell & Front - that were not included in these screenshots), as soon as I scroll down and those two frames are off the screen, and then scroll back up, those two cameras are no longer live streaming...this does not happen on any other camera.

This all happens in the app as the web portal works just fine.

[BrookeN]

Yes, we are aware of that behavior. The dev team is currently looking into this. 

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN 

Oh good...just trying to be helpful 😁

Now I'm worn out...that took a while to compose and put together 😉

[BrookeN]

The team is actively looking into this. I will update you again soon. 

[Jeff28210]

This is a serious security and privacy issue. No pictures or video should be taken without the explicit action or consent of the owner if the cameras are not actively monitoring (i.e. motion or audio). 

[Edinburgh_lad1]

These black tiles occur when you go to Dashboard but not when you're in Devices. 

I agree with the previous poster that cameras should not be taking snapshots/refresh every 7-8 hours. They should show a snapshot of the last recorded video and that's that. 

[Jeff28210]

I think it's a violation of Federal law (FCC). Essentially they are taking electronic surveillance of someone's private residence without their knowledge or consent.  What if one of my children is running around the house naked and they automatically take a pic and upload it to the cloud. Now your into potential child pornography. Even the FBI needs a Warrant to bug a house.  What will happen to their stock price (Ticker: ARLO) when this gets out?

[BrookeN]

The NOW feature has been disabled and the dev team is working on improving and releasing a new version of the feature in the future

[Jeff28210]

There is another similar thread on this topic, so I am posting here so all are aware and can comment:

Are snapshots being taken and not displayed on thumbnails?  There is no way of knowing.  Even before this "feature" was "fixed", these Just Now refreshes were not being displayed on all devices.  When I launched the Arlo app on my Android, it would take a refresh picture from every camera I had and update the thumbnails on my phone.  However, when my wife went into the Arlo app on her Apple phone she did not see them.  When I went into the portal via a computer browser, the new thumbnails did not appear there either.  So it's totally possible they are taking pictures without our consent whether we see them or not.

Now, I have reported the following twice.  At 10am eastern (exactly), my cameras are "waking up" and doing something - either taking a picture, video, or both but not displaying it on any thumbnail or Feed.  I witnessed it first hand a couple days ago when I audibly heard my camera click.  The next day at 10am, not only was there a click but the two red lights (infrared) lit up.  On all occasions, I did NOT launch the app on any device or portal.  Nor was the device scheduled to do anything.  Nor was the device in an active mode, meaning it was not monitoring for motion or audio.  So why are my cameras taking action without my action, knowledge or consent?  

This morning I took a video and you can audibly hear the "click" on the camera which happens when a snapshot is taken.  Today there were no lights, presumable because it was light enough in the room that it didn't need it.

Can Dev / Support please comment on this?

[KachinaShadow]

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@Jeff28210 wrote:

Are snapshots being taken and not displayed on thumbnails?  There is no way of knowing.  Even before this At 10am eastern (exactly), my cameras are "waking up" and doing something - either taking a picture, video, or both but not displaying it on any thumbnail or Feed.  I witnessed it first hand a couple days ago when I audibly heard my camera click.  The next day at 10am, not only was there a click but the two red lights (infrared) lit up.  On all occasions, I did NOT launch the app on any device or portal.  Nor was the device scheduled to do anything.  Nor was the device in an active mode, meaning it was not monitoring for motion or audio.  So why are my cameras taking action without my action, knowledge or consent?

This morning I took a video and you can audibly hear the "click" on the camera which happens when a snapshot is taken.  Today there were no lights, presumable because it was light enough in the room that it didn't need it.

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@Jeff28210 - Not sure this helps you, but I've checked a couple of my cameras and the only time there is an audible click is when I open the app after it's been off for quite some time.

@BrookeN - Looks like, at least for me, the issues originally described in the thread have been resolved...Thanks

[KachinaShadow]

One issue fixed...and another takes its place 🙄

So...now that the black tiles problem has been resolved, it's been replaced with this problem (pics below) which is what appears every time I log in to the app...started yesterday. To get past this you have to select Devices, which appear fine, and then go back to Dashboard. After that the images are fine until you log back in to the app again.

[jguerdat]

@JamesC , @ShayneS , @BrookeN I'm seeing exactly the same thing on Android.

[KachinaShadow]

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@jguerdat wrote:

@JamesC , @ShayneS , @BrookeN I'm seeing exactly the same thing on Android.

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Android here too...and It's even worse this morning as all of my seven cameras are like this except for the doorbell camera.
It seems to only be an issue with the app as the web portal is just fine and, unlike yesterday where it was only in Dashboard, it's also in Devices (four pics attached).

Interesting thing about this is that after restarting the VMB5000 all the tiles show images like they should but if I leave the app and login again it's back to the same blurred or solid color tiles, only this time the doorbell and six of the seven cameras are messed up...one camera shows a normal image

[BrookeN]

Thank you for providing that information. I sent it to the development team to investigate. I will reach out soon. 

[Edinburgh_lad1]

So, the last Android app update introduced blurred tiles on the dashboard! 

Can someone finally please explain to me how it's possible to have so many issues with every release, and when we as customers will finally be treated as such rather than an army of free testers? 

[Edinburgh_lad1]

Is a collective complaint to the management of Verisure (here in Europe/the UK) the way forward so that things can start improving? 

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN 

Up until today, when I started the app and the tiles were blurred, I could toggle from Dashboard to Devices and the images would show.

Tonight all tile images (Dashboard & Devices) were blurred and toggling back and forth would not bring up any clear images, so the only way I had to try and fix this was to restart the hub and wait for it to reboot and even then only a few tiles had clear images and the only way to get clear images on the blurred tiles was to tap each blurred tile 3 to 4 times until a clear image showed.

Needless to say, this is unacceptable and someone needs to expedite a fIx ASAP...I can't wait 5 minutes or more trying to get a clear image so that I can then live stream a camera.

Please get this to someone who can put a rush on fixing this problem.

[BrookeN]

@KachinaShadow thank you for updating me on the behavior you are now seeing. I reached out to our team, I will update as soon as possible. 

[douglas458]

When I open the latest arlo application,  all three camera images are blurred. This just started occurring around one week ago. Using my older Samsung phone opening the same version of thr arlo application, the three camera images are not blurry. 

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN 

Also note that since this blurred issue started that first thing in the morning, when I first open the app, I always have one or two cameras that are offline and display "Your Arlo device appears offline, Please make sure it's powered on and connected to the internet" and no matter what I do, short of removing & reinserting the battery, those cameras will only come back online at their own choosing, from minutes to hours apparently on their own random timeline.

Note that this camera offline problem did not occur prior to this blurred tile issue and only happens upon the initial opening of the app, after sitting idle throughout the night...any other time the app is opened (after being idle for just a short time) the issue is just with the blurred tiles and not the "device offline" problem.

[BrookeN]

Thank you for providing this information. I will pass this onto the team as well. 

[jguerdat]

BTW, Android app 6.15 is working slightly better but still not good.