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Smart TVs like Samsung, LG and Roku are tracking everything

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211–220 of 316 posts

Re: Smart TVs like Samsung, LG and Roku are tracking everything

#212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps it is time to wrap our TVs and other consumer electronics in faraday tape. I can't wait until my microwave tells the manufacturer how often I'm reheating my pizza.

I can see a future where it will be necessary to start opening up new consumer electronics and using small wire cutters, precision screwdrivers and needle nose pliers to physically rip out the Wi-Fi functionality.

Why would this be more likely to happen in the future? Is the future steampunk? Let’s try ripping WiFi chip off present day pcb and see what happens.

Re: Smart TVs like Samsung, LG and Roku are tracking everything

#213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have about 400% more trust of Microsoft and Sony than I do of random smart tv manufacturers. It should be noted Sony's TVs are different than their game consoles in what they collect and do. They run a relatively clean version of Android TV except for "Samba TV", which is yet another piece of show-recognizing (known as ACR) analytics. However, you can apparently decline its privacy policy on initial setup and eve…

My Sony Smart TV is crap and I will never buy another Sony TV. Yes it runs android. It's slow to respond to input. Sometimes when I'm guessing it needs to page out code it can take 5-30 seconds before u can actually use it. It's crashed in the middle of watching shows and I mean the TV is being used as a dumb tv with input from an external source and suddenly android reboots. It also covers the home screen with ads f…

I own a Sony smart TV - it’s awful. Far and away the worst piece of consumer electronics I’ve ever owned. It’s ruined Sony for me as a brand. I always take the opportunity to tell people how much I hate it whenever the opportunity comes up.

Re: Smart TVs like Samsung, LG and Roku are tracking everything

#215

Roku scares me when I'm watching movies on my Rapsberry Pi. They are .mp4 files. I'm not using their software at all... and about 2 minutes in I get a pop-up "You can view this move elsewhere at XYZ." How do they know what movie I'm watching? They are analyzing the feed. Scary.

> They are analyzing the feed. Scary.

More likely just looking at the title of the file and matching that against themoviedb.

Re: Smart TVs like Samsung, LG and Roku are tracking everything

#216
post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VLC supports casting to a local network Chromecast. It works fantastic.

And Plex!

There's also Cast All The Things (catt)[0], which makes any of the hundreds of websites supported by youtube-dl[1] cast-able.

[0] https://github.com/skorokithakis/catt/

[1] https://ytdl-org.github.io/youtube-dl/supportedsites.html

Re: Smart TVs like Samsung, LG and Roku are tracking everything

#217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When i got my samsung smart tv 4 years ago i actually read the EULA and was so disgusted i refused to agree. It lives its life as a computer monitor, and a buggy one at that. I doubt there is a way to update the firmware without agreeing. Moral of the story: dont buy smart TVs.

If you want a TV, is there any alternative? We got a new TV last year and I (joe shmoe average user) didn't see any that weren't smart.

In Europe I buy dumb panels from https://www.swedx.se/index.php?cPath=133

They are mainly aimed corporate buyers, I have one 42 inch TV and one small video wall (4x42 inch) from them.

Re: Smart TVs like Samsung, LG and Roku are tracking everything

#218

In my opinion you should not use ANY of the smart features of a "smart" TV. Don't give it your wifi key and don't put it on your LAN. I have about 400% more trust of Microsoft and Sony than I do of random smart tv manufacturers. I also have a fairly high degree of confidence that the xbox one and PS4 software will remain up to date with security patches, and address critical issues quickly. I have no confidence for T…

Roku scares me when I'm watching movies on my Rapsberry Pi. They are .mp4 files. I'm not using their software at all... and about 2 minutes in I get a pop-up "You can view this move elsewhere at XYZ." How do they know what movie I'm watching? They are analyzing the feed. Scary.

By recording and matching soundbites on their servers, similar to what the app Shazam does.
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