HomeKit HKSV can’t stream, but thumbnails update

[Morac]

I have an Ecobee SmartCamera which was working fine, but today I left on vacation and now I’m getting a “No Response” when I tap on the camera. What’s odd is that if I kill and restart the Home app, the thumbnail will update once a minute, but the moment I tap on the camera it says it’s not responding and the thumbnail changes to “No Response”. Basically streaming and presumably recording isn’t working.

The camera works fine in the Ecobee app, but not HomeKit. I have 3 hubs: an Apple TV 4K and 2 HomePods. One of the HomePods is the primary. All other HomeKit devices are working.

Is there a way to fix this that doesn’t involve me being home? I have someone coming to the house periodically. Would unplugging the camera and plugging it back in fix this or is it an issue with the HomePod?

 

[Itinj24]

I have an Ecobee SmartCamera which was working fine, but today I left on vacation and now I’m getting a “No Response” when I tap on the camera. What’s odd is that if I kill and restart the Home app, the thumbnail will update once a minute, but the moment I tap on the camera it says it’s not responding and the thumbnail changes to “No Response”. Basically streaming and presumably recording isn’t working.

The camera works fine in the Ecobee app, but not HomeKit. I have 3 hubs: an Apple TV 4K and 2 HomePods. One of the HomePods is the primary. All other HomeKit devices are working.

Is there a way to fix this that doesn’t involve me being home? I have someone coming to the house periodically. Would unplugging the camera and plugging it back in fix this or is it an issue with the HomePod?

I don’t have the Ecobee camera but power cycling my Logitech Circle 2’s usually fix any issues.

If you have a router that lets you view and control while away from home, you can try rebooting that from where you are. That helps my camera issues as well.

 

[StumpyBloke]

Exactly the same issue with all of my various cameras. Hasn’t worked for a while. However they do work fine on my iPad running the latest iOS 16 beta. But I did note though I could view the cameras live when connected to the mobile network rather than my internal Wi-Fi network. Only tested that once though.

 

[Morac]

So this is weird. The guy came to my house and I not only got a HomeKit notification of motion, but got a recording. I still can’t access the camera for streaming though.

 

[w5jck]

I wonder if there is a setting that can block/unblock access from devices on a different network than the one Homekit is running? Maybe you have to authorize Homekit and/or the camera to allow access to the cellular (or alternate Wi-Fi) network you are using while on vacation.

 

[StumpyBloke]

Just found out what the culprit was for me.

I installed Microsoft defender on my iPhone the other day including the optional VPN configuration. And that was blocking HomeKit camera live view working on my local network. As soon as I turned off VPN everything worked again.

 

[icanhazmac]

I have similar issues, though intermittent, I also believe that my VPN is the culprit. It is only an issue when I am trying to view the cameras on my home network. When I am traveling, vacation, etc. I have no issues.

 

[Morac]

So streaming started working on its own. I chalk it up to the unreliability of HKSV.

Why We Don’t Trust Apple’s HomeKit Secure Video—and You Shouldn’t Either

Apple’s cloud service for security cameras has so many great features (including the price)—but we don’t recommend it for most people.

www.nytimes.com

 

[StumpyBloke]

I have similar issues, though intermittent, I also believe that my VPN is the culprit. It is only an issue when I am trying to view the cameras on my home network. When I am traveling, vacation, etc. I have no issues.

Exactly the same

 

[thedr1]

Thanks for the inspiration, bc cellular streams live on my iPhone! I don't want to miss out when away from home, so this is essential, and I can breathe easier!

All my devices use identical VPN config, so that's not it--my MacBook (wifi) and AppleTV (ethernet) stream live fine, but nothing (iPhone, iPad) else would. ((Either streams fine if I connect to my second wifi network (go figure). I blame HomeKit Accessory Security firewall rules for not handling my off-script network configuration.))

 

[frank68]

same issue here: streams fine on cellular network, but not on internal network (wired or WiFi). iOS 16.5.1

 

[Morac]

same issue here: streams fine on cellular network, but not on internal network (wired or WiFi). iOS 16.5.1

Try rebooting your router or the camera. I found that some routers cause HomeKit to freak out now and then. I haven’t had this problem since replacing my router with a different one.

If rebooting the camera fixes this, I’d recommend a cheap controllable outlet (Blink, Eve, etc). Which you can use to remotely reboot the camera.