Holy $#@#$ ! TalkBack feature activated !
Apr 28, 2021
1
In case this ever happens to anyone here ! This was a HUGE PITA !
So my GF's phone randomly just completely freaked out ! The symptoms were, it started buzzing repeatedly, it was putting green boxes around everything you clicked on, it was using some weird digital voice, but like 10 X's normal speed, it would not reboot... Let's see, what else ? I totally thought it had some sort of virus, and after struggling with it for probably two hours, I went online (on my phone) and started researching.
Right away, I found several similar accounts, and they all said that the "TalkBack" feature had been activated ? Apparently this is some sort of accessibility thing for blind people... Like a tactile and sound thing ?
But here's the thing, it was about 4 layers deep in settings, and with each thing, I had to click once, to get a green box around the item, then double click to open it. Next, it would not scroll... So if a setting was not high enough on a page without scrolling, I had to use voice command... After the single click to put a green box around the mic, then a double click to activate it ! When I finally managed to get to the right place, sure enough, "TalkBack" was on. Clicked it once, to put the green box on it, then double clicked to slide the toggle to off !
Bam ! Fixed ! That was just rediculous. Honestly, it's not like my GF was carrying it in her pocket or purse, and accidentally just clicked a bunch of random things ? I think the phone just glitched and turned this feature on by itself.
In any case, if this ever happens to you, hopefully you will remember this post...
PS, her phone is a Pixel 3a XL, but it seems like this is not phone specific. Maybe just Android specific ?