neonate 2019-09-18 21:27 UTC link

kminehart 2019-09-18 21:30 UTC link

When can I buy a TV without smart features? I don't doubt that my smart TV is reporting some data about my usage, but I barely have a choice in the matter.

amdelamar 2019-09-18 21:57 UTC link

One of the first images to appear on my Samsung TV, after purchasing and plugging it in to the power outlet, was a prompt asking to connect to my WiFi.

They almost got me, but thankfully there was an option to skip that step. But I'm sure they'd hook my parents and friends for sure.

the_svd_doctor 2019-09-18 22:06 UTC link

I tried to never connect my Smart TV to anything, but I realized one day (when someone's stuff was playing on it without me accepting any request...) it connected an open network in my residence. The only trick that worked to prevent it from connecting was putting the wrong password, and let it loop forever, trying to connect. Ugly.

isostatic 2019-09-18 22:07 UTC link

Just wait for TVs and other gadgets with built in 5g and iot sim cards that you can’t simply “skip network” on.

throw03172019 2019-09-18 22:07 UTC link

I disabled WiFi on my Samsung TV after they were injecting ads into the home screen. Spend $800 to get ads served in their shitty/slow UI.

sys_64738 2019-09-18 22:10 UTC link

Did anybody really believe that data wasn't being sent to ad companies like Facebook? Our default position should be to assume it is so until it is proven otherwise.

beamatronic 2019-09-18 22:15 UTC link

You can make a Smart TV into a dumb TV by simply not allowing it to connect to the Internet, ever.

mikeryan 2019-09-18 22:15 UTC link

This is a pretty open secret within the industry. Geographic data can be provided via setup (a lot of TV's ask for a zip code on setup) or usually simply via GeoIP lookup.

Dig a bit deeper and you get into service provided by Samba TV and or Inscape and you can find that they're sending back frames of video in a lot of cases to track what you're watching.

This data is becoming a huge mechanism for subsidizing TV sales and the interactivity is being looked at as a huge opportunity to recoup some of the ad spend being lost via streaming and fewer 30 second spots.

With new TV's its time to view them as private as a browser (With less controls).

https://samba.tv/ https://www.inscape.tv/

ping_pong 2019-09-18 22:29 UTC link

This is why I (currently) trust Apple, because they appear to care about privacy. I am not blinding myself to the possibility that this may change, but right now this is their selling poin tto me.

dangrover 2019-09-19 00:13 UTC link

It is not clear why we should necessarily be suspicious of smart TVs based on the findings here.

The lines seem to be blurred between what data is being sent by the TV OS itself versus a third party app that someone may have decided to use during the period that the researchers watched outbound network connections.

If someone is using the Netflix app, this necessitates that the TV must communicate with Netflix. How else would it work? Similarly, if you use the YouTube app, you would definitely get some requests to Google. Surely some developers of smart TV apps have decided to use Mixpanel or Adobe for analytics.

The "sensitive user data" alluded to in the headline is later admitted to be, at a minimum, "information about the device people are using, their locations, and possibly even when they are interacting with it".

Let's unpack that. It's pretty common for every web browser to send a user agent. Why shouldn't apps for a TV send device info to the app maker? Location can be inferred via IP, like any network request (nothing special here). And with any request, you of course know the time it was made (and could infer the interaction that produced it, like opening the app).

So they've told us nothing to support the headline. Indeed, the original paper from Northeastern notes that they did not try to inspect the data or MITM encrypted connections, so all we know is that requests are being made to these services during the course of operating the device and its apps. Not that the device manufacturer itself is sending your data, unprompted, to these third parties. So, the headline does not match the story.

Seems like university PR office must have gone a little crazy with this one. Why is nobody on HN questioning such a sensationalist, substanceless article?

abstractbarista 2019-09-19 00:56 UTC link

I couldn't find info in the article about the whether LG (WebOS) Smart TV's still do this even if you opt-out of all the "Channel Plus" and other sketchy advertising/user-tracking features in the menu.

I guess it's time to fire up Wireshark. I love these TV's because they can be integrated with home automation like Home Assistant. But maybe it's time to put it on a VLAN with no access to the WAN.

fitzroy 2019-09-19 01:24 UTC link

PSA: If you mostly like to watch movies and/or cinematic TV (with the lights off, or in a dimly lit room), consider a home theater projector instead of a TV. In a dark room (even with white walls) the image is fanatic in cinema mode, and nearly as good (and quite a bit brighter) in "living room" mode. Best of all, they have absolutely zero "smart" features.

I bought an Epson PowerLite Home Cinema 8345 Projector refurbished for around $470 a couple years ago to replace my 720p Panasonic AX200U. The Epsons have a solid warranty and will easily project a 100"+ image in a dark room on a basic (<$200) screen. The bulbs work out to about 10 cents/hour of usage.

This 3100 is basically the newer (and better) version of mine for $684, and the one I'd get if I was buying today. https://epson.com/Clearance-Center/Home-Entertainment/Home-C...

p1mrx 2019-09-19 03:46 UTC link

My TV (Vizio P55-C1) doesn't have a "disconnect" option. I either need to do a factory reset, or change passwords three times (WiFi AP to temporary, TV to temporary, WiFi AP back to normal.)

I suppose I could just never connect it to WiFi, but then it wouldn't get firmware updates.

dandare 2019-09-19 05:33 UTC link

I still don't understand this whole "business model". Could someone ELI5 these three questions?

1) How exactly is this targeting information useful to advertisers? Do they pay for targeting in order to pay for fewer ads?

2) Where is the market for "user data"? How do you sell your blog visitor's data?

3) How much is the data worth? Some equivalent to CPM? Could you monetize your blog not by showing ads but by selling user information?

ghostpepper 2019-09-19 06:04 UTC link

I would love to update my 10 year old 1080p Philips non-smart TV to a 55" or so 4K HDR screen but I don't want any of the smart features. Does anyone know of any manufacturers selling high end "dumb" TVs?

For now I'm comfortable using my appleTV but I like the fact that I can disconnect it at any time. I want a TV that will simply display whatever signal it receives without any connectivity required.

siempreb 2019-09-19 08:18 UTC link

> Smart TVs sending sensitive user data to Netflix and Facebook

No way! Has that ever been news? It is the first thing that comes to mind when some product 'needs' to be connected to the internet. Sending private data is most likely the only reason a internet connection can be made with the device. All the 'great' software around it is only fluff supporting to lure people sending their private data unknowingly. Do they send microphone and camera data home? Of course, that's the cream. Oh, and do they protect your sensitive data well? Nah, that's not a priority, who cares..

In the past you bought a new tv, and the manufacturer was happy and treated you with respect. Today you think you buy a tv, but tv is actually the secondary feature, you just bought an intrusion device that collects your private life in order to send it to the manufacturer for selling it.

I have a new x-large smart tv which I would never connect to the internet for these reasons. I use a dedicated pc with a good graphics card that connects through HDMI. On my couch I have a wireless mouse and keyboard. With this dead simple setup I cannot only watch regular tv, I can of course do anything you can think of doing on a pc. It also has become my favorite gaming setup.

I think governments should be more active to protect citizens of course. Non-technical people are prey nowadays. I despise this new economy and I'll never ever want to make any money of of it, I'd rather live and die poor.

gorbypark 2019-09-19 09:07 UTC link

Kind of off topic, but I have an older Samsung smart tv. It has an ethernet connection, but it didn't have any option for WiFi. For a few years I had it wired up to ethernet, and after rearranging where my router lived in the house I didn't have a long enough ethernet cable, so I hooked up a USB WiFi dongle. It worked great for a few months until I needed that dongle to connect a Raspberry Pi to WiFi, so I stole it from the TV...and lo and behold the TV still had internet access via WiFi! The only thing that I think could have happened is that the TV had WiFi hardware but was disabled in software, because at the time a WiFi TV was selling at a premium and this was a cheapo one I bought from Wal-Mart. So I guess hooking up the USB dongle somehow unlocked it. It kinda freaked me out that there was hidden WiFi hardware in there.

edit

The tv definitely phones home too, my Pi Hole blocks a few hundred attempts to lookup log-ingestion.samsungacr.com, xpu.samsungelectronics.com and upu.samsungelectronics.com per day.

squarefoot 2019-09-19 09:19 UTC link

I wouldn't be that hard to make a small firewall to put in between the TV and the Internet, with rules that block unwanted traffic - or better, block it and inject fake data - while allowing normal use of the TV.

This cheap SBC comes to mind, there's a very similar one from OrangePI too. https://www.friendlyarm.com/index.php?route=product/product&...

It would be nice having say a version for traveling with laptops etc if we don't trust the hotel connection and one to protect from being spied by the SmartTVs, where changing from one to the other requires nothing more than swapping an SD and reboot.

vlozko 2019-09-18 21:40 UTC link

It’s pretty simple: don’t connect it to the internet. Use something like AppleTV or your own box that you trust to show your streaming services.

jamesponddotco 2019-09-18 21:52 UTC link

I got a Samsung "SmartTV", turned it on and the first thing I saw was advertisement and an insane amount of calls to Samsung servers on my Pi-hole. On the TV I just paid for.

Opened it up, disconnected the WiFi module, connected my Apple TV to it and am pretty happy.

topspin 2019-09-18 21:57 UTC link

> When can I buy a TV without smart features?

There is a limited selection of 'dumb' TVs in the world. The 50-inch Sceptre E505BV-FMQK has no "smart" capabilities and lacks WiFi or Ethernet.

The usual advice is to simply not connect the internal "smart" capabilities to anything; disable WiFi and don't connect a Ethernet cable. The built-in host and all the nefarious crap it wants to run can't reach anything unless you somehow connect it. Just use the TV tuner and HDMI inputs. If you need a network connection for streaming from some local source then block the TV at your Internet router.

Like the adware you get with many laptops and other mobile devices there are 'financial incentives' to manufacturers to build this stuff in, so don't expect the practice to abate anytime soon.

farisjarrah 2019-09-18 22:00 UTC link

Next time, make a VLAN with its own Wifi, then connect the TV to that VLAN and then what you want to do is block any incoming or outgoing network traffic to the smart TV. If you do this then no one else can attempt to hijack or connect to your TV and the TV wont ask you to connect it to a network, because its already connected to a network. This worked great on my LG smart TV.

nicwolff 2019-09-18 22:08 UTC link

I bought an LG OLED commercial signage display. It's just a 55" panel, 1/4" thick, with a ribbon cable to a power-and-control box with one HDMI port. No internet or wifi connection; the software just lets you use the remote to configure the display.

Into it I plugged a Denon HEOS receiver, which is WiFi-connected for the purposes of serving as a Spotify and AirPlay output device, and which drives wired and wireless speakers. Into the HEOS runs an Apple TV for video streaming, a DVD player for old times' sake, and my wife's phonograph.

lrem 2019-09-18 22:16 UTC link

An acquaintance attempted that with Kindle, by keeping it in flight mode. After some days it popped up a message kindly asking to give it some network access. After a few more days it simply ignored the flight mode and connected to get fresh ads.

Edit: I've checked with my wife who has an ad supported Kindle for over a year and keeps it in flight mode for months at a time. It never did that to her. So either Amazon changed that a long time ago, or I've believed a lie.

Godel_unicode 2019-09-18 22:16 UTC link

I have an extra SSID which has no internet access and logs all of the things for exactly this reason.

boring_twenties 2019-09-18 22:16 UTC link

In a hn thread the other day, someone told me their TV will simply connect to any open wifi networks it comes across, just to phone home. I couldn't get the brand or model out of them, though.

nfoz 2019-09-18 22:19 UTC link

Here's mine: https://www.lg.com/ca_en/commercial-tv/lg-55UX340C-public-di...

You have to find your way to the "commercial" section of LG's website and even then find the ones that are dumb.

I'm very happy with it. 55" 4k, a bit cheaper than its comparable consumer line. Simple remote, doesn't hassle me, quick to start and stop.

I was able to purchase it from "Canada Computers" but YMMV in your region etc. Not always easy to get the "business" line of products as a consumer but very often (TVs, laptops) it is preferable to the junk they'll sell to consumers from the big box stores even at the same price-point.

mrbonner 2019-09-18 22:21 UTC link

My Samsung SmartTV randomly turns on itself. Sometimes, we can't turn it on and I have to remove the batteris from the remote, plug them back then it works. The UI is sooo sluggish. I just wish they make a dump TV with superior image quality and let the other streaming devices handling the "smart" features. I will not buy another Samsung electronic product.

0xEFF 2019-09-18 22:28 UTC link

Many new cars already have this anti-feature.

Godel_unicode 2019-09-18 22:31 UTC link

5g is incredibly sensitive to physical interference, I'm sure someone will make a cool looking antenna cover for popular models.

slivanes 2019-09-18 22:39 UTC link

Apple cares about privacy enough to make Google their default search provider for many billions each year. Apple pays lip service to your privacy and obviously cares more about money just like any other corporation.

paxys 2019-09-18 22:44 UTC link

Not even a secret. A TV manufacturer publicly said a while ago that a TV without "smart" features is more expensive for the company (even if sold at the same retail price) because they cannot make any money from selling usage data.

dvdbloc 2019-09-18 22:47 UTC link

Pro tip for other people with 2019 and 2018 Samsung Smart TVs, if you back out of the network config and never set it up during the initial config or after a factory reset the TV will never show any ads and will never have the annoying icons for its own apps in the menus. If you attempt to use these features the TV will kindly remind you that you are not connected to the internet/have no accepted the user agreement. I have done this on all of my Samsung TVs and the result is a much cleaner UI.

favorited 2019-09-18 22:51 UTC link

I was shocked when a medical device I got had a built-in CDMA modem to send telemetry to my insurance company. Thankfully there's an airplane mode.

obmelvin 2019-09-18 22:53 UTC link

Roku enabled TVs very clearly send back frames of what you are watching. I've been watching YouTube casted via chromecast plugged into HDMI (NOT the built in chromecast, I have verified multiple times) and the Roku will give me a full width toast saying to press `*` to watch the full movie or some similar contextual option

I was pretty put off the first time this happened. That said, I don't even know if I looked through the settings to see if I could turn it off..

Marsymars 2019-09-18 23:44 UTC link

If a TV manufacturer added ads to my TV after purchase, I'd feel ethically obligated to return the purchase as defective.

pdkl95 2019-09-18 23:53 UTC link

Various system-on-a-chip devices with built-in TLS/CDMA support have been available for years. The only reason TVs/etc still ask for local WiFi access is using the cellular networks requires negotiating some sort of contract. Left unregulated, they will eventually move to cellular. we already see this happening with cars; cheaper devices are only a matter of time.

sha666sum 2019-09-18 23:57 UTC link

I've heard about this before. Which manufacturer? Although I'm never buying a smart TV, it's interesting to maintain a mental blacklist of vendors.

diminoten 2019-09-19 00:06 UTC link

Yeah, how dare they, you barely got out of there with your life...

Seriously, the melodrama people treat their privacy with is frequently astounding.

freeone3000 2019-09-19 00:36 UTC link

Because it interferes with the idea of a TV being a display. A TV should not have apps. If it does have apps, these apps should not communicate data to the manufacturer. It shouldn't send back data about the operating system because a TV shouldn't have an operating system.

dghughes 2019-09-19 00:38 UTC link

I can't watch more than 5 minutes of any YouTube video on my Samsung smart TV before an advertisement interrupts the video. Often several times for short videos. The ads are the same ones over and over too at the moment it's the J-Lo Hustler movie. If not that it's an ad from my local tourist board advertising my own home town.

It's getting to the point where it's not even watchable. I click back to exit and maybe go back later but I have hundreds of partially watched videos I've forgotten about.

cyanbane 2019-09-19 00:43 UTC link

How do Doctor's that use TVs like this in meeting rooms get around HIPAA? or other places with PII, etc? With so much stuff being thrown to TVs now, a lot of times they are inheriently monitors, and there are very few people who think taking a screenshot of a monitor is not invasive.

dontbenebby 2019-09-19 02:28 UTC link

>This data is becoming a huge mechanism for subsidizing TV sales and the interactivity is being looked at as a huge opportunity to recoup some of the ad spend being lost via streaming and fewer 30 second spots

So what are the options for a consumer willing to pay for privacy? Will console manufacturers be more respectful for example? (I've considered a console to serve as a bluray player / host OS for streaming apps that also plays games).

Or are we stuck using dumb tvs and connecting out laptops to them via HDMI? (And thus no 4K iirc)

dreamcompiler 2019-09-19 04:37 UTC link

TVs should be dumb enough to never need firmware updates. I realize many do, but I consider that a design flaw.

xxs 2019-09-19 05:37 UTC link

you can block any device by their mac on your router

xxs 2019-09-19 05:41 UTC link

in that case, either:

  - place them in a faraday cage
  - open and cut the antenna trace

nabla9 2019-09-19 05:50 UTC link

>Do they pay for targeting in order to pay for fewer ads?

Yes. There can be more and smaller advertisers when you can tailor ads to the market. Nontargeted advertising is economic only for biggest brands.

Data that is collected sparsely can help to identify interests and match ads to users. Geographic location helps to match adds from your local market to the blog the user is currently reading, for example.

Continuously collected information can be used to direct and predict behavior. The user matches profile of stressed person. People under stress have low impulse control, show them ads for products that are typical impulse purchases. S

>Where is the market for "user data"? How do you sell your blog visitor's data?

You don't. You add common trackers to your site and receive income from ads trough them.

> Could you monetize your blog not by showing ads but by selling user information?

No. This does not work in small scale. Single blogger can't create much value by selling data directly. Google or Facebook do that.

theshrike79 2019-09-19 06:26 UTC link

LG seems to be the least crappy option here.

But if you're willing to spend some extra $$, you can get a "meeting room display" with the same panel, but zero smart features and no speakers.

ecmascript 2019-09-19 06:34 UTC link

I would recommend getting a projector if you have the space!

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