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Samsung TV owners complain about increasingly obtrusive ads

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Re: Samsung TV owners complain about increasingly obtrusive ads

#271

Post by ptersilie »

When I bought my LG TV a few years back it did the same. The ads were mostly for apps you can download on the LG app store (so no yoghurts or anything). But they were still annoying enough for me to look into the DNS queries the TV does and block some of them. In case it's useful for some of you, here's what I found out and ended up blocking:

  - vcfd1.giraffic.net, vcfd2.giraffic.net: adaptive Video acceleration (seems to be used for internet TV)
  - GB.lgtvsdp.com, ngfts.lge.com: don't know what this does.
  - GB.ibs.lgappstv.com: needed to download apps and updates
  - snu.lge.com: used to check for software updates?
  - lgtvonline.lge.com: likely for the TV recommendations feature that remembers what you watch and gives you recommendations based on it
  - GB.info.lgsmartad.com: ads
  - yahoo.com: no idea why the TV needs to talk to yahoo. Blocked.
  - facebook.com: why!? Blocked.

Re: Samsung TV owners complain about increasingly obtrusive ads

#272

Post by p_l »

random_visitor wrote: post #119
flucivja wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just thinking what would happen if I block connection to Ads services in my router...

That's pretty much what a pi-hole is. According to my friends who use a pi-hole to filter their connection, it makes almost everything ad-free

The pi-hole will be bypassed by hard-to-kill DNS-over-HTTPS, however.

Re: Samsung TV owners complain about increasingly obtrusive ads

#273

Post by logicallee »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #181
logicallee wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's play a hypothetical game. Your TV attempts to literally control your life. And is ultra HD and really cheap. But you have to keep its front facing camera uncovered or it blares an alarm saying that its front camera is covered. The alarm also activates, but more quietly, if it loses its internet connection. Finally, there is a 30 second "sponsorship punishment" if it sees you have brought a product competing wit…

>Finally, there is a 30 second "sponsorship punishment" if it sees you have brought a product competing with its sponsor. There was literally a Black Mirror episode about something very similar.

yes, you're right. (Though I think it wasn't about a TV watching your food choices.) So what happens legally if, today, a company literally does it? How do you legislate against this?

It is literally possible for a television to include a punishment timer (as in, it is pretty trivial to code up, if the device isn't rooted.) What happens if a company sells one that literally identifies shopping and uses a punishment timer for people who buy a competitor to their sponsor instead of their sponsor? can you make it illegal?

Re: Samsung TV owners complain about increasingly obtrusive ads

#275

Post by ta8964586 »

deergomoo wrote: post #185
skocznymroczny wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't trust most smart TVs, that's why I bought a dumb TV from TCL. If I want any fancy smart functions, I'll just connect an android box via HDMI.

I would love to do this, but dumb TVs pretty much top out at the upper-mid range. If you want a high end panel you're getting all the bullshit too, unfortunately.

Look at "digital signage" TVs built for business are available that don't have the consumer software. They are of course more expensive and optimized more for continuous usage (16hr/day 7days/week for samsung), but as of now I don't believe they get ads pushed to them.

https://www.samsung.com/us/business/products/displays/4k-uhd...

Re: Samsung TV owners complain about increasingly obtrusive ads

#276

Post by mark_l_watson »

Our Samsung TV in our living room has been unplugged for about three months. I wanted to give it to charity and have new “plant friendly” shelves installed instead of the TV nook, still need to talk my wife into that.

Before the great unplugging, I set the Internet connection on the TV to be to my iPhone. I almost never have my iPhone hotspot turned on, so I could do TV updates when needed, otherwise starve it for an Internet connection.

BTW, no TV works for us because we stream to my wife’s large iPad Pro and she bought a fancy stand that can position the iPad anywhere in space. We site next to each other and place the iPad just under three feet away. We like this setup.

Re: Samsung TV owners complain about increasingly obtrusive ads

#277

Post by pja »

snarfy wrote: post #262
fxtentacle wrote: post #84

... and that's exactly why my TV will never have an internet connection. By now, it doesn't really matter which brand you use. I have analyzed Samsung, Sony, LG and Philips and ALL of them send data about your usage to NetEase in China and ALL of them have ToS that say that they might record your voice and store it for improving their AI or whatever. Plus all of them shove suggested apps in your face, so I'd say it i…

I have an LG. I never connected it to the internet, but it still has a built-in, always-on, no-way-to-disable wireless access point that pollutes the wireless channel it broadcasts on.

I suppose you could open the back and unplug the aerial cable from the motherboard. Unless they’re using one of those tiny surface mount aerials of course :(

Re: Samsung TV owners complain about increasingly obtrusive ads

#278

Post by my123 »

garblegarble wrote: post #202
traveler01 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is so stupid. When I bought my TV it didn't behave like this, but now for some stupid reason I need to get ads on it? I mean, normal TV it's 90% ads 10% content, do we need to watch even more ads? Anyone has any idea on how adding a filter like AdBlocker to your router? Never thought about this but it's getting useful af.

I do this and it's been somewhat useful - you need to disable blackhole rules periodically to get app updates though (and the TV will send a storm of DNS queries your way if you dare to block queries) Frustratingly, recently the latest Plex app stopped working with the block rules I had in place, so I've had to allow through a lot more of the TV's traffic to samsung domains than I'd like. My primary annoyance is Sams…

The Shield TV runs Android TV, so you are just moving your point of trust to Google instead...

Re: Samsung TV owners complain about increasingly obtrusive ads

#279

Post by notyourwork »

neya wrote: post #31

Fuck the guy who wanted to suck up to the management in some stupid meeting projecting estimated revenue out of this to ask for a raise later because he "contributed to a revenue increase" to the company. There's absolutely no after thought to this decision - If I paid 1000s of dollars for an "idiot box" that's supposed to reproduce faithfully the signal that I pass it, showing ads is unacceptable, no matter what the…

This is why my tv stays offline and isn’t setup. My Nvidia shield runs to hdmi and is the only playback source.

Re: Samsung TV owners complain about increasingly obtrusive ads

#280

Post by Kipters »

ahelwer wrote: post #110
nonninz wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have also a LG TV, and I used to keep it disconnected at all times as all my streaming comes from the nVidia Shield anyway. However recently I wanted to setup my home automation system to automatically turn the TV off when I go to bed or outside, and for that I needed to connect it to the home network. I solved this by confguring the router firewall to drop any package from the TV to the internet. It works!

Sadly google has started serving ads on the android TV home screen, which will presumably affect the shield.

Mine doesn't show ads (yet?). I hope that means pihole is effective enough in blocking them.
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