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What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

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Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#301

Post by JeremyBanks »

antisthenes wrote: post #293
criley2 wrote: post #291

Just further confirms that "Smart" TV's are a ripoff at best and a scam at worst. Never, ever, ever buy a television described as smart. For any reason at all. All of the solutions are miserably pathetic. All of the solutions are riddled with bugs, design omissions and potentially nasty security zero days. All implementations have little to no update support from major third parties. And, in many cases from many comp…

I don't understand why someone just doesn't hook up their TV with their computer via HDMI or DP. Is switching sources too complicated for people? Even the shittiest Dell boxes these days have 2 video outputs, I believe, so you can run 1 monitor + TV. Most laptops have an extra video out port too. That way you can actually type on your keyboard when you search youtube, unlike typing with god forbid, a remote or an xbo…

Cluttering up my living room by running a cable across it isn't very attractive, nor is the general experience of using a non-stationary laptop with a giant cable hanging out of it. I much prefer using a Chromecast, or using my Xbox with a wireless keyboard (which I have stashed under the coffee table, within reach whenever I need it).

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#302

Post by Arizhel »

richardwhiuk wrote: post #60
ktta wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

There's an absurd amount of technical knowledge that you are suggesting that every household in America should subscriber to. Also, if you have a SmartTV, you probably need to allow it contact the internet, otherwise playing internet TV (Netflix, iPlayer, Hulu, etc) is not going to work. If it can access Netflix, it can probably phone home with your data.

We need to configure our routers to allow access to neflix.com, but disallow access to viziospyservice.com.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#303

Post by jrockway »

webXL wrote: post #274
xtracto wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

It's also possible that the friends saw this ad first, thus planting the idea in the first place.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#304

Post by logfromblammo »

malz wrote: post #191
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.

The Wirecutter's top TV pick is a non-smart one, ironically a Vizio. "In a departure from the trend toward smarter and smarter sets, the Vizio P-Series lacks built-in smart-TV features. It’s basically a dumb TV, not just lacking apps but also dispensing with a tuner." http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-tv/

If it doesn't have a tuner, doesn't that just make it a monitor with speakers?

If you're using a STB, that hardly matters, but I'd think a cord-cutter would like the option to plug an antenna in the back and watch OTA stations without needing extra hardware.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#305

Post by pnutjam »

webXL wrote: post #274
xtracto wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Your wife's friends probably searched it and facebook lumped you all together in their algorithm.

Still creepy.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#306

Post by sosborn »

jaimex2 wrote: post #123

I caught my TV doing this and went to war. For the last two years I have had a service running that floods garbage data back to the collection point from several addresses throughout the Internet. You're welcome.

I'd love more details on this. It would make a great supplement to something like Pie-hole.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#307

Post by pnutjam »

dx034 wrote: post #217
mmrezaie wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not, when you are abroad it is kinda the only way you can watch many of the content that is not available in other countries. Even subtitles are not available in English in some countries like Sweden.

Because Netflix blocks VPNs since a few months. It's really hard to find a vpn that works with netflix. Even setting up your own won't work, most ip ranges that are used by data centres are blocked by default.

He said he pays for Netflix, but torrents on a VPN.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#308

Post by hfsktr »

kodt wrote: post #280
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?

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.

WTF is wrong with that site. I enabled the scripts so that I could use the filters, waited while it refreshed several times, and it just covers the screen with a pop up that just re-opens when you close it. That was one of the worst I've visited.

It's probably because of the ad blockers but still a site should be a little functional without all the scripts and ads.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#309

Post by criley2 »

antisthenes wrote: post #293
criley2 wrote: post #291

Just further confirms that "Smart" TV's are a ripoff at best and a scam at worst. Never, ever, ever buy a television described as smart. For any reason at all. All of the solutions are miserably pathetic. All of the solutions are riddled with bugs, design omissions and potentially nasty security zero days. All implementations have little to no update support from major third parties. And, in many cases from many comp…

I don't understand why someone just doesn't hook up their TV with their computer via HDMI or DP. Is switching sources too complicated for people? Even the shittiest Dell boxes these days have 2 video outputs, I believe, so you can run 1 monitor + TV. Most laptops have an extra video out port too. That way you can actually type on your keyboard when you search youtube, unlike typing with god forbid, a remote or an xbo…

Because a full desktop UI is vastly inferior to a simple remote interface if you don't have a full mouse/kbb available, and having to have a mouse/kbb to, I don't know, pick a movie is very lame from a couch user perspective.

Because you can get 4K/HDR with regularly updated high quality third party apps like Netflix from Roku for $80 with hardware that can handle it/

But a Media PC running Windows would require you to spend several multiples of 80$ to achieve 4k/HDR with a good remote.

More work, more setup, more money, more configuration, and frankly the end result isn't better.

Easier to use your PC as a media server, then use Roku to read from the server using a remote on your couch.

Re: What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen

#310

Post by EdSharkey »

passivepinetree wrote: post #15

The amount of money they made from that data is probably orders of magnitude more than the paltry $2.2 million penalty. I hate to get all paranoid, but it seems like every day there's news of a company's data being hacked, and what information isn't being hacked is being actively sold. What can an average citizen do (short of living Ron Swanson-style in a cabin in the woods) to protect their privacy?

Isn't there money to be made in simply selling honest software and hardware that doesn't spy? A profitable consumer electronics and software company could be established whose products didn't monitor, aggregate, or stalk its customers with ads.

I should think there's enough awareness of these kinds of antics in the market now that a successful company could be established soon that has the creation of honest, respectful tech as its M.O. A venture like that could be profitable AND disruptive.

I suppose to guarantee the privacy of its customers, such a company would necessarily have to have vast product offerings - or lots of like-minded partners - to compose a comprehensive landscape of services that could replace the privacy-violating services their consumers currently rely on. A sort of privacy walled-garden.

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