You sit down to relax, put on your favorite show, and settle in for a night of binge-watching. But while you’re watching your TV… your TV is watching you.
Smart TVs take constant snapshots of everything you watch. Sometimes hundreds of snapshots a second.
Welcome to the future of “entertainment.”
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I just don’t own a tv. Getting rid of my entertainment and gaming systems and most of social media was my answer to internal peace. I don’t have streaming either.
I guess I’ll stick with my 2012 Toshiba 55" dumb TV.
The built-in OS on smart TVs almost always sucks. The built-in OS on our LG is slower, has less apps, and has less support for HDR and higher resolutions than our Fire stick.
Just don’t use it and instead plug in a Fire stick, turn off its tracking, then sideload apps like BeeTV and HDO Box.
I know Amazon has a bad rep from a privacy standpoint but the Fire stick is super cheap compared to its competition and lets you turn off the tracking in one page of the settings menu.
No, it’s not. It has not connected to the internet.
Some TVs will sneakily connect to open APs to try and phone home. It is nasty but it does happen. You can only be worry free if you yank out the radio module. Some TVs make it easier than others (My LG TV made it as easy as opening the back of the TV and disconnecting, YMMV)
My TV isn’t a “smart” tv.
Well, so, about that.
A lot of TV’s will form mesh nets with same brand-or even across brands-, until they find one that is connected. I’ve even heard reports of one with a sim card¹.
¹in a 'smoke filled room’² ²okay it was a van. A smoke filled van. And she was on some other stuff too.
Where can I read about these mesh networks?
Think there was an article in… I think wired a couple years back.
My thoughts exactly. My Xbox is spying on me instead.
I think you meant - Me Xbox is spying on my instead.
Yup same, running a shield
Jokes on them: I watch videos on my tablet. There’s no way that’s spying on me, right? Right?
Spy all you want Agent Hisense of the Roku org, I’ve got you in a black box. Your communications have been cut! You’ll never report back to HQ now!
What 4K TV can I buy that doesn’t do this guys help? Or should I stick to monitors???
You can buy any TV. Just turn off the tracking in the settings and plug in a streaming stick.
I mean… Just don’t hook the TV up to the internet. Don’t join your WiFi network on the TV.
Kind of a simple solution.
Doesn’t work anymore. They do dark mesh networks.
No it’s not! I had a goddamn Sony tv and it wouldn’t let me change certain settings unless I connected it to the internet! They try to force your hand!
What about connecting to a mobile/theter and change password after you adjusted your settings? 🤷♂️
Do you remember the model number? I would like to research this.
Until the cost of a sim card w/service is less than the revenue they generate from it. Which I fear is scarily close.
You can’t activate the warranty without it. Then once it knows it can go online it will constantly harass you.
“You can’t activate the warranty without it” That’s illegal in most of the world
Calm down, it’s a TV.
I got xiaomi, opened it up and disconnected the Bluetooth / wifi card. Connect it to a linux device and now it is a shitter version of a dumb tv. It’s crazy how smart tvs really really suck at being dumb. But it does work once you get used to some annoying quirks.
Tip: connect a cheap air mouse/keyboard to it as a remote
I’ve never allowed my TV to have an active route to the internet since I bought it in 2019, it’s exclusively fed over HDMI by gaming consoles and an Apple TV.
The thing is, HDMI 1.4 added HEC, so what’s to prevent media players from serving as an Ethernet switch and providing an internet connection to TVs.
HEC feature enables IP-based applications over HDMI and provides a bidirectional Ethernet communication at 100 Mbit/s
I think the bandwidth is too slow for HD/4K Streams.
I am sure the 100 Mbit/s must also be theoretical maximum, i would be impressed if practical cables supports even half the orignal specs
for streaming, yeah, for tracking its plenty
for streaming, yeah, for tracking its plenty
Apple TV is watching you 😁
Does anyone know if there’s a domain blocklist for smart TV telemetry? If so, I could easily put it into my DNS server, like I already do for ads.
I’d like to continue using my streaming apps without resorting to yet another device. I have an HTPC that runs KODI but I think it’d be a pain to replace all of my streaming apps.
A couple I’m aware of:
But like flightyhobler suggested, if you keep an eye on your DNS logs with Pi-hole or managed services like AdGuard DNS and NextDNS you’ll get a better idea of what’s still getting through.
Thank you for posting this! You saved me a search
Turn the TV on and keep an eye on the logs. Many of the common blocklist already block that kind of telemetry.
It’s almost like we should have strong data privacy laws so companies can’t spy on everything we do…
European liberals are trying to weaken gdpr
But think of the corporations! Why isn’t anyone thinking of the poor withering corporations?!
My TV is not a smart TV, it’s not spying on me.
How old is it ? Which one did you buy
Well, maybe a Hisense or a cheap soundbar might have a listening device, but they’ll be hard pressed to phone home.
So does your isp, and uses that for targeted ads. My pihole is constantly blocking a domain ran by xfinity that collects data for their targeted ad service
I don’t think those two facts are related? Your isp doesn’t need to connect to its servers from within your local network to track your internet usage. Something else in your network must be trying to connect to that domain
What domain do I can make sure it’s blocked?
This
Thanks, looks like it’s on the Stevenblack list.
Id also like to know what lists hes using
It’s on https://raw.githubusercontent.com/StevenBlack/hosts/master/hosts
I also have additional lists from firebog.net, and I use jacklul/pihole-updatelists to maintain it.
I’m using like 30 block lists with over 1,900,000 blocked domains. There is a site that had a bunch of blocklists and I just grabbed most of them
I’ve really gotta look into pihole.
Me too
It’s really been great
Can I get some more info. Do you know what device on your network is asking for said address?
Roku: has its own problems, but I dont use the smart tv features and turn them all off especially the wifi. It doesnt talk to my isp and ive never got requests from it.
I think it’s my LG TV. But it has its own service that I also block.
Here is the service from xfinity that I’m talking about. It’s relatively new to my network and has increased my blocked percentage by a lot. Mind you, I have 1,900,000+ domains on my blocklist
Are you using isp provided hardware?
My experience with said items has been poor. Literal open doors to your network.
I’m using my xfinity router/modem in bridge mode to my router.
Do whatever you can to remove this from your network as soon as you can. OpenWRT as a suggestion.
YOUR tv is spying on you. MY tv has no smart capability.
How does that help me though?
I think they are inviting you over to their place to watch some (dumb) TV?
Finally, some good TV :)
Disconnect it from the internet…?
no it isn’t. yours might be, but not mine.
It doesn’t if you don’t connect it to the internet. Fortunately most smart TVs still have HDMI inputs so you can use them as dumb TVs with a PC.
Yep. My TV has not and never will be on the Internet in any way. I picked it for its screen quality, and the fact that it also has “smart” components never even entered into the decision. Because those smart components will literally never do anything.
