What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen
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Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen
#2Huge schocker /s
Pretty sure that Samsung does very similar things. I've been interested in actually capturing outgoing pcap data for this purpose. Looks like I have a new project to add the pile.
Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen
#3>On a second-by-second basis, Vizio collected a selection of pixels on the screen that it matched to a database of TV, movie, and commercial content. What’s more, Vizio identified viewing data from cable or broadband service providers, set-top boxes, streaming devices, DVD players, and over-the-air broadcasts. Add it all up and Vizio captured as many as 100 billion data points each day from millions of TVs.
> The order also includes a $1.5 million payment to the FTC and an additional civil penalty to New Jersey for a total of $2.2 million.
Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen
#4Could we merge this with https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13581771
Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen
#5It's amazing this was settled for a few million dollars. It's easy to imagine an alternative press release where the settlement was 10x or even 100x larger.
Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen
#6A 2.2M settlement is absolute peanuts compared to the mountains of cash they likely made.
Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen
#7Are they shielded from a class action suit now?
Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen
#8This is promising and is a good start towards IOT precedent, and perhaps even operating systems of our devices (Windows 10).
- Explain your data collection practices up front.
- Get consumers’ consent before you collect and share highly specific information about their entertainment preferences.
- Make it easy for consumers to exercise options.
- Established consumer protection principles apply to new technology.
I wonder how many technical teams are scrambling to undo their spying now - though this is a fairly insubstantial fine. I could see the data being potentially worth more than $2.2m
Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen
#9It's amazing this was settled for a few million dollars. It's easy to imagine an alternative press release where the settlement was 10x or even 100x larger.
but then Vizio wouldn't make a profit. The FTC has to make sure these companies continue to be profitable while itself appears to be semi-competent. Similarly, Verizons supercookie "crackdown" was laughable. FTC stands for Fuck the Consumer because that is their primary objective.
edit: I phrased the above incorrectly. I meant to imply that the FTC is beholden to these companies and largely does their bidding. Except in narrow circumstances, the FTC really is a tool of the major corporations it is supposed to regulate.
Fuck the FTC.
Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen
#10Huge schocker /s Pretty sure that Samsung does very similar things. I've been interested in actually capturing outgoing pcap data for this purpose. Looks like I have a new project to add the pile.
Why do you think Samsung is doing this as well?