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I have a few Android TVs and Android TV boxes around the house, and one common nuisance is: that if the time and/or date are incorrect, then the internet for those devices won't work. Also through the ISP we use, the automatic time/date checkbox option does not work either.

The Android TV devices only forget the time/date once a month at most. But it is very unintuitive for someone to think that the time/date needs to be correct for the internet to work. Once more with the incorrect time/date, the internet in Firefox for Android still works. But not for Chrome or YouTube (if the date is incorrect). It's very frustrating and has been like that for years despite performing all the Android system updates available.

Why do the time and date need to be correct for Chrome & YouTube to work on Android TVs and TV boxes?

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  • Not having a correct date could be a symptom too, not necessary a root cause. I'm wondering how getting date/time automatically can depend on ISP. Can you share a bit more details?
    – Máté Juhász
    Commented Aug 1, 2022 at 7:08
  • Its just it has never worked from our home. But works from other friends places, and the ISP is the only difference. Its like it can not resolve the IP address from the domain name of the time date server through our ISP.
    – clinux
    Commented Aug 1, 2022 at 20:46
  • I suppose I can try a different name server through the connection settings than the one provided by our ISP to try and get the IP address of the time/date server resolving.
    – clinux
    Commented Aug 1, 2022 at 21:04
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    A lot of WiFi routers also work as NTP server (AFIK announced via DHCP). May be the router of the one ISP does not provide NTP services?
    – Robert
    Commented Aug 2, 2022 at 7:09

2 Answers 2

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A correct date or at least a date not too far away from reality is important for every internet device in these days.

The reason is that internet connections are mostly HTTPS (HTTP over SSL/TLS) connections and one integral step for establishing TLS is checking the used server certificate if is is trusted and valid. Each certificate contains two dates: not valid before and not valid after. The time span between both dates defines the period in which the certificate is valid. This validity period lasts between 3 to 12 months.

So if your system date is so wrong that is is outside of the validity period then the validity check can fail even if the certificate is perfectly valid and the TLS handshake will fail and so no connection can be established which means no data can be transmitted.

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  • I'm sure the time had to be correct too. I can test that on my android tv box later to see if only the date needs to be correct. That can save me time later if I only have to fix the date. One of our android tvs forgets the time/date every time it is switched off. I'm guessing it has a dead CMOS battery, and so can't remember the time/date while powered off. It had that problem when we bought it brand new.
    – clinux
    Commented Aug 1, 2022 at 20:50
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Your isp most probably started filtering the ports due to an attempted ddos attack or something. Maybe they did some wrong configuration for which ntp port is blocked and thus the tv / tv box is not getting time from ntp. I had this problem for a month and today the senior engineer of my home internet isp fixed it.

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