Why does my Sonos system turn itself on, playing a random song!?


kind of spooky...

157 replies

As I recall, there was once an IFTTT issue, and also Bluetooth receiver issue causing an auto play when the sending device got in range, kind of like when your car starts up, it auto plays your phone’s content. But as controlav says, to this point, it hasn’t been an issue in Sonos’ software. Always external. 

This happened to me last night for the 2nd or third time. My wife and I were both asleep and no one else was on the WiFi (confirmed via my eero router app). No timers were set. One of three speakers randomly turned on and was playing a random song from Spotify that I haven’t listened to in ~5 years.

 

I submitted diagnostics this morning: 1215834492

 

Any suggestions?

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My money is on Spotify Direct, CR200 or cats.

@controlav only ever connected my Spotify and both of us who use it were asleep; don’t have a CR200 or a cat...

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Well then Iwould recommend you unlink Spotify Connect, there is a security exploit apparently that uses it.See this thread: https://community.spotify.com/t5/Other-Partners-Web-Player-etc/Delete-or-quot-unlink-quot-devices-on-spotify-connect/m-p/1722285#M33126

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If Spotify keeps triggering playback from one of your devices that was connected, the best way to disconnect is to just play something else. All Sonos systems have Internet Radio on them, just play 2 seconds of any station. It'll disconnect the active Spotify Direct Control session, and you won't have to worry about someone else starting up a stream.

I’ve had this problem for YEARS. After I listen to spotify i close the spotify app (on laptop or phone) and turn on the TV for a few seconds ,which breaks the spell.  (I’ve used the Radio trick successfully, too! 👍🏻)

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I've just submitted 143 628 7262.. my Sonos play1 just played around 30 seconds of music. The source of the music was my NAS (configured as music library.

The album had been played 2 days (via app on phone) before, it had got to the end and stopped.

None of the phones configured to this house were in use.

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BTW, this is not a one off. It happens every few days. I've submitted multiple diagnostics.

Could something be interfering with the Move, I was grinding coffee at the time and the coffee grinder is sat right next to the Move, the Sonos started to play and the lights on top of the move were flashing white and red (i think). I have submitted a Diag report so hopefully got it in time

Mine has just started doing this - it’s like someone has pressed the start/stop button as it resumes the radio station we normally listen to, except... louder.

So far it’s done it three times:

05:33 on Monday;

05:35 on Friday;

05:37 on Sunday.

I’m struggling to see those times as random, or as times that some external influence would pick.

Yes we do have cats, but after Monday (when I assumed they were the cause) and after reading all the above, I checked on Friday and Sunday and none of them were near the bedroom unit at the time (the only one they can get to overnight); all were fast asleep elsewhere.

No we don’t use Spotify.

Diagnostics 501954724 submitted immediately on Sunday...

On a related note - can I see the Sonos logs data anywhere myself? Is it available to view alongside the other data visible via the controller’s IP address via http?

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On a related note - can I see the Sonos logs data anywhere myself? Is it available to view alongside the other data visible via the controller’s IP address via http?


Basic logs are available on the PC (at C:\ProgramData\SonosV2,_Inc\runtime), but not detailed enough for this type of issue. Those require the UPnP telemetry, which only Sonos support have access to.

On a related note - can I see the Sonos logs data anywhere myself? Is it available to view alongside the other data visible via the controller’s IP address via http?


Basic logs are available on the PC (at C:\ProgramData\SonosV2,_Inc\runtime), but not detailed enough for this type of issue. Those require the UPnP telemetry, which only Sonos support have access to.


OK, thanks.

And, damn. It’s the kind of thing that would be a whole lot easier to figure out for ourselves if there was any form of accessible event logs.

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OK, thanks.

And, damn. It’s the kind of thing that would be a whole lot easier to figure out for ourselves if there was any form of accessible event logs.

Not really, as someone who reads [Xbox] diagnostic logs on a daily basis, this level of logging requires serious domain expertise. The PC log I listed is somewhat readable, but it is the exception for this kind of thing in my experience, not the rule. Its actually one of the more readable ETW logs I’ve seen.

I should point out that I have an amount of expertise in the IT monitoring / diagnostics / root cause analysis world and access to some relatively impressive tooling, too…

;)

On an unrelated question, the apps your signature reference - are you allowed to name them here? Always interested in options, particularly if the IOS app restores the ability to play directly from my phone’s music collection...

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I should point out that I have an amount of expertise in the IT monitoring / diagnostics / root cause analysis world and access to some relatively impressive tooling, too…

;)

On an unrelated question, the apps your signature reference - are you allowed to name them here? Always interested in options, particularly if the IOS app restores the ability to play directly from my phone’s music collection...

LOL understood. My apps are listed in my Profile, I get into trouble putting their names in posts. Its ok for me to post other people’s app names, just not my own. It does not do direct play which you asked about, because it could not for the same reason the Sonos app cannot, even if I was to write a ton of code to try. There is no allowed iOS background mode that works for it.

I have exactly the same problem. I think it will be a hell of a problem to see what the exact cause is, given that I have several Google Homes connected and a Homey (device from which you can create automatically iftt's scenarios). 

However, I've never encountered this problem before. I do not have cats and did not give anyone access to my WiFi or spotify. 

I read a lot of the same problems on this forum, but I don't see an actual solution provided besides that it is an external problem. 

Has someone succeeded in solving this issue?

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I

Has someone succeeded in solving this issue?

Gather a diagnostic right after it happens, post the number into a fresh thread, and Sonos support can tell you why (or at least the IP address of the offending device). The Spotify app is the most common non-physical cause, based on empirical evidence here.

Sonos, please fix this issue. Aside from this thread, Google shows others having the same trouble across various products, but all with the mobile app.

My specific issue is with a linked TIDAL account playing via the Sonos (Android) app randomly. I’ll submit a diagnostic next time it happens, but you should have plenty of these from others already.

https://en.community.sonos.com/amazon-alexa-and-sonos-229102/randomly-playing-music-in-the-middle-of-the-night-6796580
https://www.reddit.com/r/sonos/comments/aug01q/random_music/
https://www.reddit.com/r/sonos/comments/bwqhj0/sonos_randomly_turning_on/
https://en.community.sonos.com/troubleshooting-228999/why-does-my-sonos-system-turn-itself-on-playing-a-random-song-6809234/index4.html

Had the same thing happen.  We were outside without our phones and the house started thumping some genre I don’t listen tO

 

929042741
 

I lost the first number .. hopefully this one isn’t too late.  I pressed play on a device a few minutes ago to see if a cat could have pushed it (no). The others have the touch buttons turned off

This has not happened to me, but the Amazon Alexa forum also has similar reports of Alexa randomly saying things when not asked. My view with Alexa (and I don't see that it couldn't also apply to Sonos) is that these are (presumably) both cloud-based systems and they presumably also have bugs. I.e. responses to requests don't also go to the originator, they go to some random client. 
 

Most previous instances of 'random' play on Sonos have turned out to be caused by pets, Spotify Connect or Alexa. 

Sonos is not a cloud based system.

My Sonos have started playing lullaby-like music at around 8-9 every morning the last week. I have checked and we don’t have any alarms set on the Sonos App nor do we have a cat or any other pet. We have a daughter but she hasn’t been near the speaker or any other smart device. We have WiFi that is password protected and haven’t handed it out to any of our neighbors.

 

We use Spotify to play music and I ran diagnostics a minute after it happened this morning and got the confirmation number: 1822972322. I checked the Sonos app while the music was playing and I couldn’t see that any music was playing so turned it off via Alexa.

 

Any idea what might be causing it?

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Any idea what might be causing it?

Spotify Connect is the usual cause.

You don’t have any alarms in Sonos…. what about in Alexa?

Has anyone else used their own Spotify app to play music on your system recently?

Has the device used to set up Alexa on your system also been used to set up Alexa elsewhere?

The diagnostic should help identify the origin of the ‘play’ command.

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