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What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

ftc.gov

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Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#271

Post by 72deluxe »

wrsh07 wrote: post #36
jasonwilk wrote: post #21

It's not worth buying any of these 'Smart' TVs. I don't know whether it is a shoddy developer experience provided by the likes of Samsung / Vizeo etc or if it's the developers themselves (Hulu I'm looking at you) who do not maintain their apps which are constantly bug filled. I much prefer my old dumb TV that has a Roku plugged into it. Oh yeah, and I know it's not WATCHING ME.

If you want a high end tv you don't have much choice. But also, why do you not expect your Roku / apple tv / etc to be watching you?

I have a "smart" LG TV - it's slow and a few years old. I manage to avoid LG's tracking of me by not having the Ethernet cable plugged in...

I suppose you could just buy a new smart TV and not inform it of its WiFi details.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#272

Post by monochromatic »

wrsh07 wrote: post #36
jasonwilk wrote: post #21

It's not worth buying any of these 'Smart' TVs. I don't know whether it is a shoddy developer experience provided by the likes of Samsung / Vizeo etc or if it's the developers themselves (Hulu I'm looking at you) who do not maintain their apps which are constantly bug filled. I much prefer my old dumb TV that has a Roku plugged into it. Oh yeah, and I know it's not WATCHING ME.

If you want a high end tv you don't have much choice. But also, why do you not expect your Roku / apple tv / etc to be watching you?

You do expect the box to keep track of what content it's showing you. You don't expect the tv to keep track of all content, regardless of where it's coming from.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#273

Post by JohnBooty »

ktta wrote: post #54
JohnBooty wrote: post #42

If nobody's started one yet, I think there would be an audience for a blog/vlog/whatever that reviews non-smart TVs. And/or a place that evaluates which "smart" TVs function acceptably as "dumb" when they are not connected to a network. Realistically, this would have to include evaluating things beside consumer TVs for use as living room devices, since "smart" features in consumer TVs are nearly unavoidable at this p…

Rather than avoiding such TVs, I think we're better off taking some good precautionary measures. Why buy commercial displays which usually are pretty expensive, when you can buy consumer ones and be smart about how you use it? Of course, even if they start coming with in-built wifi, just don't let them connect to anything. First, off taking control of your own home network is crucial. Get a good router, something you…

Everything you say makes total sense.

I think you have a more optimistic view than I do, though, regarding one crucial aspect...

    Why buy commercial displays which usually are 
    pretty expensive, when you can buy consumer ones 
    and be smart about how you use it?
Right. But how long until consumer displays refuse to work (or, function in some diminished way) if there's no internet connection available?

When significant numbers of people start defeating those data collection efforts, TV manufacturers will start to take countermeasures.

These data collection activities aren't simply a thing that Vizio does to make a little extra cash on the side. Profit margins on mass-market consumer electronics like TVs are notoriously thin, and expected revenue from data collection is something that Vizio factors into their MSRPs.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#274

Post by webXL »

xtracto wrote: post #265
AJ007 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for posting this. When I saw the original FTC story I recalled reading about this once or twice in the past but couldn't think of any key phrases or sources. In response to some of the other comments here, basically what they are guilty of isn't spying but failing to properly disclose and opt-in users. There is a particular major AV vendor who is selling raw clickstream data of millions of their user's interne…

What Facebook is doing is quite frankly scary. This Sunday over a birthday meeting with some friends, one of them was telling us about a restaurant called "Lucuma" (this is in Guadalajara, Mexico). My wife did nothing with her cell-phone, except having it with her during the conversation. Later that day when we are back at home, she showed me an ad about that same restaurant. We never searched for something similar (…

The restaurant most likely bought some ads that targeted your wife and your friends' demographic. It's far easier to do that than covertly access your phone's mic.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#275

Post by runholm »

spangry wrote: post #259
mbesto wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Vizio collected a selection of pixels on the screen that it matched to a database of TV, movie, and commercial content. That type of technology alone would cost you at least $2M to build. So either your statement is incorrect or Vizio got a terrible ROI on this (sans fine).

I doubt it would cost nearly that much. I could build something similar in a couple of days, and I'm not even a developer by trade. Just use something like pHash (e.g. https://github.com/JohannesBuchner/imagehash ), screen cap the centre of the screen (say, a quarter of the screen in total) every minute, hash and then send the 8 byte hex string back to home base.

The problem you are describing is one that many large companies spend huge resources on today, so guarantee you that it is not something you do in a couple of days.

Even if you had the system up and running, you would still need to create a large database system managing 100 billion data points each day and integrate the stream of information with your customers APIs.

$2m worth of developer time going into this project is very likely. Thinking you could do this in a couple of days is simply ignorant.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#276

Post by hedora »

scient wrote: post #263
mirkules wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it possible to bring about a similar complaint against Facebook with the FTC? Or, if the FTC is the wrong agency, what would be the right one? Of particular concern are "shadow profiles" - dossiers on people who have never even used or consented to using Facebook[1]. I'm no lawyer, but there could be precedent per this Vizio case. In my opinion Facebook is hugely overstepping people's privacy bounds, even if they…

By using FB, you consent to them using the information about you that others and you yourself provide. Dont like it? Dont use FB.

They still track you even if you don't have an account. Your friends give them more than enough info for them to create a detailed dossier.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#277

Post by Declanomous »

spangry wrote: post #258
FullMtlAlcoholc wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand the consumer infatuation with "smart", Internet connected devices, especially smart homes. Yes auto lighting and hvac systems are cool, but it introduces so many security vulnerabities that it's not worth it. I dont ever see myself using autonomous, internet connected cars. I cant think of a bigger hacking target for terrorists and mischief makers alike.

Me neither, but it seems like we haven't even come close to the limit of what people will tolerate. For example, Johnson & Johnson has/had an insulin pump on the market that could easily be triggered remotely (i.e. be used to remotely murder you): http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/10/05/animas_diabetes_pump... And their response was basically "yeah, it's not that big of a deal, don't worry about it". Someone with rea…

It's the type of attack where you'd never even be able to track down the perpetrator. They should at least add a chime when it is activated so that the users can take note and chug some gatorade or something.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#278

Post by Arizhel »

72deluxe wrote: post #271
wrsh07 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want a high end tv you don't have much choice. But also, why do you not expect your Roku / apple tv / etc to be watching you?

I have a "smart" LG TV - it's slow and a few years old. I manage to avoid LG's tracking of me by not having the Ethernet cable plugged in... I suppose you could just buy a new smart TV and not inform it of its WiFi details.

From what I've read, some smart TVs actually require you to connect them to the internet for them to work at all.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#279

Post by webXL »

spangry wrote: post #258
FullMtlAlcoholc wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand the consumer infatuation with "smart", Internet connected devices, especially smart homes. Yes auto lighting and hvac systems are cool, but it introduces so many security vulnerabities that it's not worth it. I dont ever see myself using autonomous, internet connected cars. I cant think of a bigger hacking target for terrorists and mischief makers alike.

Me neither, but it seems like we haven't even come close to the limit of what people will tolerate. For example, Johnson & Johnson has/had an insulin pump on the market that could easily be triggered remotely (i.e. be used to remotely murder you): http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/10/05/animas_diabetes_pump... And their response was basically "yeah, it's not that big of a deal, don't worry about it". Someone with rea…

Someone would really, really have to have it out for diabetic geeks for this to be plausible.

The scary stuff I worry about is what an evil scientist, like the one from 12 monkeys, could do with a deadly virus. This type of evil gets more far more "bang for the buck". I guess both are equally plausible. I might worry more about your scenario if I were diabetic!

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#280

Post by kodt »

wrsh07 wrote: post #36
jasonwilk wrote: post #21

It's not worth buying any of these 'Smart' TVs. I don't know whether it is a shoddy developer experience provided by the likes of Samsung / Vizeo etc or if it's the developers themselves (Hulu I'm looking at you) who do not maintain their apps which are constantly bug filled. I much prefer my old dumb TV that has a Roku plugged into it. Oh yeah, and I know it's not WATCHING ME.

If you want a high end tv you don't have much choice. But also, why do you not expect your Roku / apple tv / etc to be watching you?

You could buy a high end Digital Signage display. Usually these are "dumb" and also have no TV tuner or consumer type settings. But are high quality, designed to be powered on 24 hours a day and have great picture quality. Because of the lack of additional image processing, they often have some of the lowest input lag as well.

http://www.samsung.com/us/business/displays/digital-signage/

Prices are much higher though.

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