Listen to incoming Whatsapp messages/notifications

Question

I'm working on a notification based app, for which I need to listen to incoming notifications. I've been able to listen to incoming calls, SMS, mail etc. I have no clue how to listen for pings or messages from friends on Whatsapp via code. Can this actually be done? If so, how? Can Accessibility Service be used for this, using Package Name as "com.whatsapp"?

Answer 1

I was able to do this using Accessibility Service . Using this, you can listen to all notification on the notification bar. I listened to application-specification by adding the package name to the Accessibility Service service info , which in this case was com.whatsapp. I couldn't read the messages, but I get notified whenever a message arrives.

Answer 2

Aug 11, 2020 Update

You can use NotificationListenerService to listen for notifications and get contents.

Here's example implementation in Java:

public class NotificationListener extends NotificationListenerService {

    private static final String TAG = "NotificationListener";
    private static final String WA_PACKAGE = "com.whatsapp";

    @Override
    public void onListenerConnected() {
        Log.i(TAG, "Notification Listener connected");
    }

    @Override
    public void onNotificationPosted(StatusBarNotification sbn) {
        if (!sbn.getPackageName().equals(WA_PACKAGE)) return;

        Notification notification = sbn.getNotification();
        Bundle bundle = notification.extras;

        String from = bundle.getString(NotificationCompat.EXTRA_TITLE);
        String message = bundle.getString(NotificationCompat.EXTRA_TEXT);

        Log.i(TAG, "From: " + from);
        Log.i(TAG, "Message: " + message);
    }
}

To enable the service insert the following code snippet into <application> tag on AndroidManifest.xml:

<service
    android:name=".NotificationListener"
    android:label="@string/notification_listener_service"
    android:permission="android.permission.BIND_NOTIFICATION_LISTENER_SERVICE">
    <intent-filter>
        <action android:name="android.service.notification.NotificationListenerService" />
    </intent-filter>
</service>

To intercept notifications, you need to request a special permission. Here's the code which you can use to open settings page where user have to allow the app to listen to incoming notifications. On my project I placed it in MainActivity.onCreate method.

startActivity(new Intent(ACTION_NOTIFICATION_LISTENER_SETTINGS))

If you need to check whether or not the notification listener permission is granted using the following code snippet:

private boolean isNotificationServiceEnabled(){
    String pkgName = getPackageName();
    final String flat = Settings.Secure.getString(getContentResolver(),
            ENABLED_NOTIFICATION_LISTENERS);
    if (!TextUtils.isEmpty(flat)) {
        final String[] names = flat.split(":");
        for (String name: names) {
            final ComponentName cn = ComponentName.unflattenFromString(name);
            if (cn != null) {
                if (TextUtils.equals(pkgName, cn.getPackageName())) {
                    return true;
                }
            }
        }
    }
    return false;
}

Old answer

I listened to incoming WhatsApp message notifications with the help of this 2 parted article which you can read it from here.

1. Configure AndroidManifest.xml

<!-- AndroidManifest.xml -->
<service
    android:name=".MyAccessibilityService"
    android:enabled="true"
    android:exported="true"
    android:label="My application"
    android:permission="android.permission.BIND_ACCESSIBILITY_SERVICE">
    <intent-filter>
        <action android:name="android.accessibilityservice.AccessibilityService" />
    </intent-filter>

    <meta-data
        android:name="android.accessibilityservice"
        android:resource="@xml/serviceconfig" />
</service>

2. Create a new file called serviceconfig.xml in /xml/ directory.

<!-- serviceconfig.xml -->
<accessibility-service
    xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:accessibilityEventTypes="typeAllMask"
    android:accessibilityFeedbackType="feedbackAllMask"
    android:accessibilityFlags="flagDefault"
    android:canRequestEnhancedWebAccessibility="true"
    android:notificationTimeout="100"
    android:packageNames="@null"
    android:canRetrieveWindowContent="true"
    android:canRequestTouchExplorationMode="true"  />

3. Create a new MyAccessibilityService class which extends AccessibilityService.

@Override
protected void onServiceConnected() {
        System.out.println("onServiceConnected");
        AccessibilityServiceInfo info = new AccessibilityServiceInfo();
        info.eventTypes = AccessibilityEvent.TYPE_NOTIFICATION_STATE_CHANGED;
        info.feedbackType = AccessibilityServiceInfo.FEEDBACK_ALL_MASK;
        info.notificationTimeout = 100;
        info.packageNames = null;
        setServiceInfo(info);
}

@Override
public void onAccessibilityEvent(AccessibilityEvent event) {
    if (event.getEventType() == AccessibilityEvent.TYPE_NOTIFICATION_STATE_CHANGED) {
        if (event.getPackageName().toString().equals("com.whatsapp")){
            StringBuilder message = new StringBuilder();
            if (!event.getText().isEmpty()) {
                for (CharSequence subText : event.getText()) {
                    message.append(subText);
                }

                // Message from +12345678

            }
        }
    }
}

4. It's ready. Now you can customize the service for your needs.

Note: Because accessibility services are able to explore and interact with on-screen content, a user has to explicitly enable services in Settings > Accessibility. More details

Note

To send replies to received notifications check out this answer.

Answer 3

Unless Developers of that app intentionally share a service , a content provider, or intentionally send out public broadcasts of events, or expose a custom broadcast registering system, there is no legitimate way in android to listen to internal workings of a third party App. App isolation is designed in Android for a very important reason: security.

Answer 4

Accessibility events only catch incoming notifications event, not when they are updated. For now, WhatsApp notifications don't display the message, only the sender. The message is then added by the WhatsApp app with an update, which can't be caught by the accessibility service.

You will only have something like "1 new message from XXX", but that may be sufficient to your needs.

Answer 5

See below example to catch whatsapp notifications:

public class Notifier extends AccessibilityService {


@Override
public void onCreate(){
    //Toast.makeText(this,"Oncreate", Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();

}

@Override
protected void onServiceConnected() {
    // Set the type of events that this service wants to listen to.  Others
    // won't be passed to this service.
    Toast.makeText(this,"Service connected", Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
    AccessibilityServiceInfo info = new AccessibilityServiceInfo();
    info.feedbackType = AccessibilityServiceInfo.FEEDBACK_ALL_MASK;;
    info.eventTypes = AccessibilityEvent.TYPE_NOTIFICATION_STATE_CHANGED ;

    // If you only want this service to work with specific applications, set their
    // package names here.  Otherwise, when the service is activated, it will listen
    // to events from all applications.
    info.packageNames = new String[] {"com.whatsapp"};
    info.notificationTimeout = 100;

    setServiceInfo(info);

}

@Override
public void onAccessibilityEvent(AccessibilityEvent event) {

    if(event.getEventType() == AccessibilityEvent.TYPE_NOTIFICATION_STATE_CHANGED) {

            Toast.makeText(this,"Notification Catched", Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
        }

    }
}

And don't forget to set permission from settings>Accessibility in order to access the system events. Allow permission from settings .

check this link

accessibility service is not started