[Bug]: Crash SecurityException: No persistable permission grants found in IONCAMROpenPhotoPickerActivity

[luisbytes]

Current Behavior

When using the photo picker, the application crashes with a SecurityException during the activity result lifecycle. This happens because the library attempts to take persistable URI permissions (takePersistableUriPermission) on a content URI provided by the system picker, but the intent data doesn't carry the required persistable flag permissions from the OS or the hosting application.

Log Crash

Caused by java.lang.SecurityException: No persistable permission grants found for UID 10184 and Uri content://media/external/file/40736
       at android.os.Parcel.createExceptionOrNull(Parcel.java:2456)
       at android.os.Parcel.createException(Parcel.java:2440)
       at android.os.Parcel.readException(Parcel.java:2423)
       at android.os.Parcel.readException(Parcel.java:2365)
       at android.app.IUriGrantsManager$Stub$Proxy.takePersistableUriPermission(IUriGrantsManager.java:315)
       at android.content.ContentResolver.takePersistableUriPermission(ContentResolver.java:2896)
       at io.ionic.libs.ioncameralib.view.IONCAMROpenPhotoPickerActivity.makeUriPermissionPersistable(IONCAMROpenPhotoPickerActivity.kt:117)
       at io.ionic.libs.ioncameralib.view.IONCAMROpenPhotoPickerActivity.launchSinglePicker$lambda$1(IONCAMROpenPhotoPickerActivity.kt:34)
       at io.ionic.libs.ioncameralib.view.IONCAMROpenPhotoPickerActivity.$r8$lambda$u6b4keYGOB1tfGwipliJ3-5MoFw()
       at io.ionic.libs.ioncameralib.view.IONCAMROpenPhotoPickerActivity$$ExternalSyntheticLambda0.onActivityResult(D8$$SyntheticClass)
       at androidx.activity.result.ActivityResultRegistry.doDispatch(ActivityResultRegistry.kt:350)
       at androidx.activity.result.ActivityResultRegistry.dispatchResult(ActivityResultRegistry.kt:311)
       at androidx.activity.ComponentActivity.onActivityResult(ComponentActivity.kt:756)
       at android.app.Activity.dispatchActivityResult(Activity.java:8381)
       at android.app.ActivityThread.deliverResults(ActivityThread.java:5334)
       at android.app.ActivityThread.handleSendResult(ActivityThread.java:5380)
       at android.app.servertransaction.ActivityResultItem.execute(ActivityResultItem.java:54)
       at android.app.servertransaction.ActivityTransactionItem.execute(ActivityTransactionItem.java:45)
       at android.app.servertransaction.TransactionExecutor.executeCallbacks(TransactionExecutor.java:135)
       at android.app.servertransaction.TransactionExecutor.execute(TransactionExecutor.java:95)
       at android.app.ActivityThread$H.handleMessage(ActivityThread.java:2247)
       at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:106)
       at android.os.Looper.loopOnce(Looper.java:201)
       at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:288)
       at android.app.ActivityThread.main(ActivityThread.java:7886)
       at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java)
       at com.android.internal.os.RuntimeInit$MethodAndArgsCaller.run(RuntimeInit.java:568)
       at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main(ZygoteInit.java:1045)

Expected Behavior

The library should either gracefully catch the SecurityException when persisting permissions fails, or check if the URI flags allow persistence before calling the method, allowing the user to select the photo without crashing the app.

Reproduction

https://github.com/ionic-team/capacitor-camera/tree/main/example-app

Screenshots / Media

No response

Environment Details

OS: Android 12

Installed Dependencies:

  @capacitor/android: 8.4.0
  @capacitor/cli: 8.4.0
  @capacitor/core: 8.4.0
  @capacitor/ios: 8.4.0
  @capacitor/camera: 8.2.0

Versions Affected

8.2.0

Platforms Affected

• iOS
• Android
• Web

Notes / Comments

The issue happens in IONCAMROpenPhotoPickerActivity.kt on the underlying ion-android-camera library inside the makeUriPermissionPersistable method. The Android Photo Picker doesn't always grant or require long-term persistence, so calling takePersistableUriPermission unconditionally causes the crash.

As a quick fix to prevent the application from crashing, we can wrap that native call in a try-catch block. Please note that while this prevents the crash, the proper long-term solution for the plugin should involve copying the selected files into the application's internal cache directory (cacheDir) to guarantee persistent access to the media.

Here is the quick fix to avoid the crash:

private fun makeUriPermissionPersistable(uri: Uri) {
    if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.R) {
        try {
            applicationContext.contentResolver.takePersistableUriPermission(uri, Intent.FLAG_GRANT_READ_URI_PERMISSION)
        } catch (e: SecurityException) {
            Log.w("PhotoPicker", "Failed to take persistable URI permission (skipping to avoid crash): ${e.message}")
        }
    }
}

[luisbytes]

An important update based on our production logs: this crash is occurring on devices running Android 12 or lower.

Additionally, these devices all share a common hardware profile: they are low-end models with limited RAM. On these resource-constrained devices, the OS handles transient process lifecycles much more aggressively when switching between the app and the system photo picker, failing to grant or maintain the expected persistable URI permissions and triggering the SecurityException.