Ios11 Photo Library Access Is Possible Even If Settings Are Set to "Never"

iOS11 photo library access is possible even if settings are set to never

Okay, you can sort of piece this together from answers and comments already, but to try to tell a more complete story...

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In iOS 11, UIImagePickerController runs as a separate process from your app. That means:

1. Your app can't see the user's whole Photos library — it gets read-only access just for whichever asset(s) the user chooses in the image picker.
2. Because of (1), your app doesn't need the standard privacy authorization for Photos library access. The user explicitly chooses a specific asset (or multiple) for use in your app, which means the user is granting your app permission to read the asset(s) in question.

You can see more about this in the WWDC17 talk on PhotoKit.

(By the way, this model matches what you've seen in the Contacts framework since iOS 9; if you show contact picker, your app only gets a one-time drop of contact information for the contact(s) the user picked, not ongoing read/write access to the Contacts database, so the contact picker doesn't require special privacy permission.)

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PHPhotoLibrary and its authorization status reflect the global read/write permission for Photos access that users can control from Settings > Privacy. (That's the one where your Info.plist needs NSPhotoLibraryUsageDescription.) Any use of the PHPhotoLibrary API requires this permission, regardless of whether your app's use of that API is only for writing or only for reading. This has been true since PhotoKit was introduced in iOS 8.

If you're not using PHPhotoLibrary, PHAsset, etc, there are narrower permission options that are new in iOS 11 (and not part of the Photos.framework API):

• As noted above, UIImagePickerController doesn't need blanket Privacy Settings permission because each use grants one-time read access for the specific assets chosen.

• If you need only to add new assets to the Photos library, use UIImageWriteToSavedPhotosAlbum or UISaveVideoAtPathToSavedPhotosAlbum. With those you can put NSPhotoLibraryAddUsageDescription in your Info.plist — then the system's Privacy Settings will make clear to the user that they're not giving your permission to see or modify existing assets, only to add new ones.

  If the user grants add-only permission, it applies only to those UIKit functions — attempting to use PHPhotoLibrary will still prompt for (and require the Info.plist key for) read/write access.

  See this part of the WWDC17 talk for more on the add-only privacy setting.

iOS11 photo library access is possible even if settings are set to never

Okay, you can sort of piece this together from answers and comments already, but to try to tell a more complete story...

---

In iOS 11, UIImagePickerController runs as a separate process from your app. That means:

1. Your app can't see the user's whole Photos library — it gets read-only access just for whichever asset(s) the user chooses in the image picker.
2. Because of (1), your app doesn't need the standard privacy authorization for Photos library access. The user explicitly chooses a specific asset (or multiple) for use in your app, which means the user is granting your app permission to read the asset(s) in question.

You can see more about this in the WWDC17 talk on PhotoKit.

(By the way, this model matches what you've seen in the Contacts framework since iOS 9; if you show contact picker, your app only gets a one-time drop of contact information for the contact(s) the user picked, not ongoing read/write access to the Contacts database, so the contact picker doesn't require special privacy permission.)

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PHPhotoLibrary and its authorization status reflect the global read/write permission for Photos access that users can control from Settings > Privacy. (That's the one where your Info.plist needs NSPhotoLibraryUsageDescription.) Any use of the PHPhotoLibrary API requires this permission, regardless of whether your app's use of that API is only for writing or only for reading. This has been true since PhotoKit was introduced in iOS 8.

If you're not using PHPhotoLibrary, PHAsset, etc, there are narrower permission options that are new in iOS 11 (and not part of the Photos.framework API):

• As noted above, UIImagePickerController doesn't need blanket Privacy Settings permission because each use grants one-time read access for the specific assets chosen.

• If you need only to add new assets to the Photos library, use UIImageWriteToSavedPhotosAlbum or UISaveVideoAtPathToSavedPhotosAlbum. With those you can put NSPhotoLibraryAddUsageDescription in your Info.plist — then the system's Privacy Settings will make clear to the user that they're not giving your permission to see or modify existing assets, only to add new ones.

  If the user grants add-only permission, it applies only to those UIKit functions — attempting to use PHPhotoLibrary will still prompt for (and require the Info.plist key for) read/write access.

  See this part of the WWDC17 talk for more on the add-only privacy setting.

I can access iOS Photo Library without requesting permission

As per UIImagePickerController behaviour, It never gives dialogue to the user for Photos access. UIImagePickerController only ask for the Camera permission.

You have to ask for Photos permission manually to the user. By using the below code you can ask the user for Photos permission.

import Photos
    
@IBAction func allowAccessToPhotos(_ sender: Any) {
    
    let imagePickerController = UIImagePickerController()
    imagePickerController.delegate = self
    let actionSheet = UIAlertController(title: "Photo Source", message: "Choose a Source", preferredStyle: .actionSheet)
    actionSheet.addAction(UIAlertAction(title: "Photo Library", style: .default, handler: { (action:UIAlertAction) in imagePickerController.sourceType = .photoLibrary
        let photoAuthorizationStatus = PHPhotoLibrary.authorizationStatus()
        switch photoAuthorizationStatus {
        case .authorized:
            self.present(imagePickerController, animated: true, completion: nil)
        case .notDetermined:
            PHPhotoLibrary.requestAuthorization({
                (newStatus) in
                DispatchQueue.main.async {
                    if newStatus ==  PHAuthorizationStatus.authorized {
                        self.present(imagePickerController, animated: true, completion: nil)
                    }else{
                        print("User denied")
                    }
                }})
            break
        case .restricted:
            print("restricted")
            break
        case .denied:
            print("denied")
            break
        }}))
    
    actionSheet.addAction(UIAlertAction(title: "Camera", style: .default, handler: { (action:UIAlertAction) in imagePickerController.sourceType = .camera
        self.present(imagePickerController, animated: true, completion: nil)
    }))
}

Please refer reference.

Important Note:

If you're not asking for Photos permission to the user then It will cause rejection by the apple team. It depends on your luck, Sometimes the apple team ignore it and sometimes reject our app.

UIImagePickerController not asking for permission

Adding the following function solved the problem:

 func checkPermission() {
    let photoAuthorizationStatus = PHPhotoLibrary.authorizationStatus()
    switch photoAuthorizationStatus {
    case .authorized:
        present(imagePicker, animated: true, completion: nil)
        print("Access is granted by user")
    case .notDetermined:
        PHPhotoLibrary.requestAuthorization({
            (newStatus) in
            print("status is \(newStatus)")
            if newStatus ==  PHAuthorizationStatus.authorized {
                /* do stuff here */
                self.present(self.imagePicker, animated: true, completion: nil)
                print("success")
            }
        })
        print("It is not determined until now")
    case .restricted:
        // same same
        print("User do not have access to photo album.")
    case .denied:
        // same same
        print("User has denied the permission.")
    }
}

Determine if the access to photo library is set or not - PHPhotoLibrary

Check +[PHPhotoLibrary authorizationStatus] – if not set, it will return PHAuthorizationStatusNotDetermined. (You can then request access using +requestAuthorization: on the same class.)

UIImagePickerController and info.plist issue

in your addNewPerson() method before showing the alert you should check if the user already granted access to his Camera you can do that by :

if AVCaptureDevice.AVCaptureDevice.authorizationStatus(AVMediaTypeVideo) ==  AVAuthorizationStatus.Authorized {
    // Already Authorized
} else {
    AVCaptureDevice. requestAccess(AVMediaTypeVideo, completionHandler: { (granted: Bool) -> Void in
       if granted == true {
           // User granted
       } else {
           // User rejected
       }
   })
}

and before that make sure you added

Any way to access the iCloud Photo Library settings using NSURL?

Actually, the iCloud Photo Library options are also in the Photos setting:

prefs:root=Photos

UIImagePickerController working without NS Photo Library and Camera descriptions

why does the app not ask for permissions with the NS usage statements

This is due to a change in iOS 11. You no longer need user authorization merely to receive a UIImage through the UIImagePickerController.

But if you want deeper information, i.e. access to the image as a PHAsset and its metadata, you do need user authorization.

And of course if you want this app to run on iOS 10 and before, you'll still need user authorization.

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