Obviously
this post was submitted on 12 Dec 2023
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Privacy
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Honestly the least I'd expect of a smart TV.
I have my old (stupid) tv from like 2013, works perfectly fine. No apps, no firmware, no ads, no tracking. Never felt the need to buy a smart tv, but I'm afraid it'd be near impossible to find a new one that isn't nowadays I'd mine broke down.
This is the only reason I have a smart TV. I didn't want one, in fact it prompted me to make an SSID and VLAN just for it, then applied a bunch of DNS blocks. Unfortunately my old 2012 TV wasn't worth shipping across the country and the image was getting pretty dim and it had started developing dead pixels.
If you want anything above 1080p that's a dumb TV you have to go commercial like the hospitality market and they charge you way more for it. And they won't even sell it to you without a corporate account in most places.
The only way to get 4K and HDR without the smarts as a consumer is to buy a giant gaming monitor... and those too ask for quite a premium, because gamers.
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laughs in crtv and dvd player
Next up: Televisions that don't have off switches and never go to sleep.
We could call them telescreens maybe
They could have a built in alarm clock that starts your day with a mandatory workout and the latest news telling us what to believe
Ones with voice activation & stuff do this already. TVs will pull a lot of power when ‘off’ since they’re not off.
Yup. A lot of folks don't seem to understand that this is the case, though.
Pretty soon, there won't even be soft-off switches anymore.
Check this out: https://www.freetelly.com/
This thing gives me serious 1984 vibes. I hadn't read the book when I first heard of this, but I now realize the name is pretty much and open play on the tellyscreens in the book. Reminds me of the black mirror episode where you have to pay to stop watching.
Since I didn't comment elsewhere on the thread, my plan of attack for now is usually older TVs (even just a few years old are still really good quality), even if they are smart but not ever connected. Apple TVs on each one, also buy the 2-3 year old version of this used for about $40-$50 not any more then I used to spend buying Roku sticks. Gives me a good enough balance for now, and before Apple haters pile on, yes it's not perfect, but there have been some studies showing these are some of the best behaved streaming devices. More importantly than what the streaming device is, I have the ability to chuck them and add a PC or whatever else without having to replace the actual TV.
It'll never tell anyone because it'll never be hooked up to the internet.
I had read a story once that if I recall correctly, one manufacturer would send the signal back thru the coax cable to the cable box just in case to make sure your data was captured somehow.
My smart TV is blocked from the internet. It doesn't know shit.
oh it knows. it just can't tell anyone!
I leave the TV on all day for the cats, I'm sure they're getting lots of useful data while they sleep in front of MASH reruns
just plug a SBC running Kodi/jellyfin/whatever non-proprietary to a regular tv
It’s extremely difficult to find a dumb tv in sizes larger than ~55”. You really don’t have much choice at the moment. I personally host a jellyfin server and play that via apple tv over hdmi, but content recognition still does its thing. Best i could do was deny wifi/ethernet to the tv and have no open networks.
Yes, do exactly this. If you have AppleTV connected to your TV over HDMI or whatever, why does your TV need an internet connection?
SmartTV: This customer loves watching Balance of Nature ads
Me: fuck balance of nature I fucking hate those stupid scammy ads!
Mine connects through pihole with all LG domains blocked. I'm not getting any update request, notifications or anything. Just Netflix.
So... Can someone explain how this is legal if you're watching DRM content? Capturing and uploading copyrighted, protected content doesn't seem very kosher.
advertisers spent an estimated $18.6 billion on smart TV ads
Jesus. Spend a fraction of that developing good products that people will actually want to buy so you can end this unethical, scumbag way of making a buck.
It says in the article there's a privacy request option if you own a samsung tv. I went ahead and sent a request to not sell my data, although not sure if it's effective since I'm not in CA.
Doubtful, since I don't have one.
surprisedpikachuface.webp
God damn webp, why is support so inconsistent?
NextDNS has a blocklist you can enable to block telemetry for Roku TVs FYI. You can also get a dumb TV or keep your TV offline and have a separate Kodi box for your shows.
on our vizio, from the settings side panel: all settings->admin/privacy->viewing data. turn it off.
I wouldn't trust it anyway. I would only trust a TV that does not have Internet access, period.
My TV must be very disappointed in me
Doesn't mention what circumstances it's tracking your watching habits. If you're watching an obscure movie on DVD, is it still looking at frames? Does it have to be through a streaming service being run on the TV? Does it recognize content being run on modern game consoles? Not a very informative article.
First, a quick primer on the tech: ACR identifies what’s displayed on your television, including content served through a cable TV box, streaming service, or game console, by continuously grabbing screenshots and comparing them to a massive database of media and advertisements. Think of it as a Shazam-like service constantly running in the background while your TV is on.
All of this is in the second paragraph of the article.
Bah! Reading! But that is concerning. Looks like I'll be disabling my wifi credentials on my TV later tonight!
Mine doesn't
care to share?
Mine's a crt with an hdmi converter. I'm untouchable
VLANed off with no internet. Can only see my Plex server. No other access
That’s why i don’t connect mine to the internet and I black hole suspicious traffic