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raxcatliu
New Participant
April 11, 2025

Request for UVC Device Support Without CAMERA Permission Restriction

  • April 11, 2025
  • 7 replies
  • 1218 views

Hi Meta Developer Community,

I'm reaching out to share our recent experience with app submission and to seek advice or support from fellow developers and the Meta team regarding the use of UVC (USB Video Class) devices on Meta Quest.

🛠Background

Our team at Actions Micro successfully published the first version of our application on the Meta Quest App Store. However, when we submitted a new version of our APK, the upload process was automatically rejected by MQDH, citing the use of a prohibited permission:

android.permission.CAMERA
“The upload could not be completed because your application contains the following Android permissions that are not supported...”

We understand from the documentation (Prohibited Permissions List) that android.permission.CAMERA is restricted for security reasons — and we fully support the need for those policies.

:exclamation_mark: The Issue

Our app does not use the Meta Quest’s built-in camera hardware. Instead, we support external UVC devices such as USB webcams, which, due to how Android works, still require declaring android.permission.CAMERA even if the built-in camera is not accessed or used at all.

This presents a challenge: we are forced to include a permission that's technically prohibited, even though our intent is aligned with security guidelines and we do not access native camera features in any form.

🙏Request for Consideration

We kindly ask the Meta developer team to consider providing an official pathway or solution for UVC-based applications, either by:

  • Allowing android.permission.CAMERA on a case-by-case basis for UVC use cases, or

  • Introducing a separate permission or mechanism for UVC access that doesn’t fall under the prohibited CAMERA scope.

We believe this would help many developers building creative, privacy-respecting applications that rely on external video devices — especially in fields like education, telepresence, remote collaboration, or medical/industrial use cases.

📩Additional Notes

We’ve already contacted support and were advised that this limitation cannot currently be bypassed, even via manual review. Hence, we're bringing this to the community in hopes of surfacing a broader need and identifying any possible solutions or workarounds others may have explored.

Thank you for your time, and we appreciate any insights or feedback.

      7 replies

      raxcatliuAuthor
      New Participant
      June 5, 2025

      Hi everyone,

      I'm following up on a previous discussion regarding the use of android.permission.CAMERA for accessing UVC (USB Video Class) devices like USB webcams on Meta Quest.

      📌 Context Update: Meta Quest OS v76

      We recently discovered that starting with Meta Quest OS v76, the system fully blocks USB camera (UVC) access, even for apps that previously worked correctly in earlier OS versions.

      This change has a significant impact on apps that rely on external video input through USB webcams — especially in cases where:

      • The app does not use the Meta Quest’s built-in camera hardware.

      • The app only needs android.permission.CAMERA because Android requires it for UVC access.

      • There is no alternative method provided by the platform to support UVC streams.

      This restriction, combined with the automatic rejection of any APKs requesting CAMERA permission (even for UVC use), has made it impossible to deploy or maintain certain categories of applications on the Meta platform.

      :exclamation_mark:Why This Matters

      There are legitimate and privacy-respecting use cases for UVC video input, such as:

      • Remote collaboration via external document cams

      • Education apps requiring external lab/whiteboard feeds

      • Medical, inspection, or industrial applications

      • Controlled environments where privacy is not at risk

      These apps are not attempting to bypass Meta’s camera privacy rules, but are instead constrained by Android’s architecture where UVC devices fall under the same permission group as native cameras.

      🙏 Request for Meta Team

      We would like to respectfully request that the Meta developer team:

      1. Clarify whether USB/UVC access is permanently deprecated starting in v76+ or whether a new permission model is in the works.

      2. Provide a pathway for apps that use UVC devices only, without accessing the native camera, perhaps through:

        • An alternative UVC-specific permission

        • A system service/SDK that safely abstracts UVC input

        • Whitelisted packages based on use case review

      💬 Call for Community Feedback

      If any developers here have successfully worked around this limitation — or have insights into future plans from Meta — your input would be greatly appreciated.

      This issue has become a blocker for us and likely affects a wider set of creators and companies innovating on the platform beyond gaming.

      Thank you for reading and for helping make this ecosystem stronger and more open.

      Best regards,
      Brian Liu
      Actions Micro

        kevenma
        Participant
        July 23, 2025

        My application also implements UVC functionality and uses the new horizonos.permission.USB_CAMERA permission. However, when uploading the APK, it was blocked by MQDH. Meta staff replied that USB_CAMERA is a prohibited permission.

        I truly don't understand this, as most USB cameras are essentially just video devices, not what one might consider a 'true' camera.

        Anonymous
        August 14, 2025

        Hey there—our team is looking into this, can you confirm the app ID that's affected?

          raxcatliuAuthor
          New Participant
          August 14, 2025

          Hi,

          App ID: com.actionsmicro.capview

          Please feel free to contact me or leave me messages if there is any issue. 😀

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