This guide is for individuals going through a Persona-powered identity verification flow. While we’ve included helpful tips, the verification was set up by the business, service, or organization that asked you to verify. They use Persona as a tool, and they ultimately decide what’s required and can assist with your specific situation, if you’re having trouble.
The download spins and never finishes
This is the most common version of the problem: you scan the code, the app starts to download, and the circle goes round and round.
- Get on Wi-Fi, or move somewhere with a stronger mobile signal. An app is a much larger download than a web page, so a connection that browses fine can still stall an install.
- Free up storage. A phone close to full will start a download it cannot finish.
- Cancel and start again from the store rather than from the link, then reopen the verification link once the app is installed.
- Check you are signed in to Google Play or the App Store. A store that is quietly asking you to sign in can look like a stuck download.
- Turn off a VPN, and get off a filtered office or school network. If the phone is managed by your employer, your IT team may need to install the app for you; see I am verifying my identity for work.
- Restart the phone and try once more.
The app installs but will not open
- Update your phone’s software if an update is waiting, then try again.
- Check the app is up to date in the store.
- Close it fully and reopen it, rather than returning to it from the background.
- Restart the phone. This clears most cases where an app opens to a blank screen.
The camera freezes as soon as the app opens
The picture appears and then stops moving, or the screen stays black.
- Close every other app that uses the camera, such as a video call, a barcode scanner, or another camera app. Only one can hold the camera at a time, and this is the usual cause.
- Restart the phone if closing them does not help. The camera can be left held by an app that has already closed.
- Check permission was granted. If you dismissed the prompt, the app cannot see anything. Grant camera access in your phone’s settings for the app, then reopen it.
- Take the phone off charge and turn off battery saving, which can throttle the camera.
- Make room. A phone with almost no free storage cannot buffer video.
If it still will not work
Do not keep reinstalling. Go back to the business that asked you to verify, tell them the app will not run on your phone, and ask whether they have another way for you to verify, such as a browser link or a different device.
It also helps them to know your phone model and what you saw, because that is the sort of detail that gets a fix made rather than a workaround suggested.