YouTube TV videos won't play due to licensing issue

For me starting on Aug 14, 2019 YouTubeTV channels stopped working on Brave but work on Chrome on the same machine. The error I get for all channels (Live or Recorded) is “Sorry, there was an error licensing this video.”

@razzam21,
There’s a good chance this is related to Widevine – you should have received a message when you visited YT TV , asking you to allow or block Widevine plugin from running. Do you remember this notification?

After discovering the issue. I did try turning off the shields and the same thing is still happening.

Details about my environment.
Brave:
Version 0.67.125 Chromium: 76.0.3809.100 (Official Build) (64-bit)

OS: (results from lsb_release -a)
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 18.04.3 LTS
Release: 18.04
Codename: bionic

I don’t recall seeing anything like that. Can I enable it in some way?

@razzam21,
Apologies for the late reply. Can you visit another site that requires Widevinecdm – Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video (to name a few) – and see if you’re prompted to install the module for those sites (note that you don’t need an account or to login to these sites to initialize the prompt)?

I tried several of those and get the same licensing error but never got a prompt or saw something in the bar indicating I could install the plugin.

Do it just need to uninstall and reinstall the Brave?

@razzam21,
A un/reinstall could do the trick – can you also check brave://components and see if Widevine is listed here in this list of components?

I don’t see widevine listed in the list of components.

Is there a way to manually install the component?

@razzam21,
Can you check ~AppData/Local/BraveSoftware and ensure that there is a Widevinecdm folder located here? If so, try deleting this folder, then trying to illicit the prompt and install Widevine again.

Mattches

      Browser Support




    August 19

@razzam21,

Can you check ~AppData/Local/BraveSoftware and ensure that there is a Widevinecdm folder located here? If so, try deleting this folder, then trying to illicit the prompt and install Widevine again.


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@razzam21,
Can you repost your last reply? I think some of the formatting got mixed up – it looks like this:

I was able to find the software and I renamed the folder for testing purposes.

I did the test twice. Letting both websites be the site that installed the component (or trigger it)

Test 1:
Rename folder, restart the browser (ensuring all closed), went Hulu, prompted for installing of Widevine, Restarted Browser, still get licensing error on Hulu and YouTubeTV

Test 2:
Rename folder, restart the browser (ensuring all closed), went to YouTubeTV, prompted for installing of Widevine, Restarted Browser, still get licensing error on Hulu and YouTubeTV

In both cases, the websites detected that the component was not installed and prompted the install. After the install, both websites didn’t prompt for the component but both failed the licensing the stream.

@razzam21,
Thank you for testing and the detailed analysis. I do have another test for you to try – would you mind downloading the Brave Developer build and see if you’re able to install and run Widevine as intended? Note that in Dev build (for the exact reason you’re requesting support), we’ve implemented a toggle in Settings --> Extensions that will Enable/Disable sites running Widevine.

Also note that downloading Brave Dev will not overwrite or interfere with the current installation on your machine. All Brave builds will run in parallel with one another.

Let me know what you find out.

I installed the dev browser. I went to YouTubeTV and it prompted for Widevine. Then restarted the browser. When it came back the screen started playing. I also tried Hulu. It didn’t prompt for Widevine but it did start playing after I turned off shields (due to Hulu and ads that have to play).

So it worked. What does this tell you about the issue I am having?

If widevine is in fact the problem, this workaround might work for you:

@razzam21,
Very happy to hear that this worked for you!
Not entirely sure what the issue was but fortunately I haven’t seen many other similar reports. I will continue to look into this issue but imagine that it will get fixed along side the next major browser update.
Thank you for your patience and willingness to work through the problem!

Thanks for the feedback and looking into this.

I copied the Widevine install from the dev build to the stable one and it fixed my issue.

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