1984 is Here, Samsung Smart TV is Monitoring You
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@scottalanmiller said:
I prefer my TVs to be "dumb", just monitors. I want to hook devices to them. AppleTV, Roku, PS3, computer, whatever. I want to choose the technology, I like my display to just be a display.
We bought a no name brand TV recently (Erickson I think? Not sure) It came with a Roku stick. It was dirt cheap for a 48" TV. No appreciable quality or build issues yet. I would much prefer that kind of integration then something being a "smart"-tv.
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The technology advances so quickly on the "smart" side and so slowly on the display side. It makes little sense to have it all integrated together. They push that because "smart" TVs age much faster and people are way more likely to replace them early and often making the manufacturers way more money.
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Good lord, it just keeps getting worse: http://slashdot.org/submission/4197957/samsung-what-is-my-smarttv-reporting-to-whom
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Finally, the TV can yell at me when I'm not working out correctly or hard enough. And also people are not looking at the other bright side: when you're alone it can automatically unlock specific programming
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It's funny, Steve Gibson talked about this on his Podcast Security Now! He basically said it's nothing to worry about because it's already happening everywhere else anyhow, and besides, they couldn't possibly be sending every single bit of recorded data back to the vendor (third party) they wouldn't have enough bandwidth...
Sadly Steve Gibson just lost some respect in my eyes today!
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@Dashrender Perhaps if the assumption is that it's unpacked, uncompressed high definition or something. You can send audio at like 16kbps quality and it's still fairly decent, and video not much higher. I don't know why he'd suggest that at all.
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@Nic said:
Good lord, it just keeps getting worse: http://slashdot.org/submission/4197957/samsung-what-is-my-smarttv-reporting-to-whom
The site said:
A wireshark capture shows that remote sites are trying to access my TV until I turn it on,
Wait, how's that possible? If the TV didn't send out any requests, how are requests getting back to his TV? He mentioned that he was behind a router.
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@Dashrender It seems to say:
"The TV continues sending data for several more seconds after the set appears to be off."
So, it doesn't matter that it's behind the router if it's coming from the TV itself, instead of the other way around.
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@Dashrender said:
@Nic said:
Good lord, it just keeps getting worse: http://slashdot.org/submission/4197957/samsung-what-is-my-smarttv-reporting-to-whom
The site said:
A wireshark capture shows that remote sites are trying to access my TV until I turn it on,
Wait, how's that possible? If the TV didn't send out any requests, how are requests getting back to his TV? He mentioned that he was behind a router.
"Off" in television terms normally means that the logic is still on.
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@scottalanmiller said:
"Off" in television terms normally means that the logic is still on.
Sure, I know that, but the author didn't mention that the TV made a request before that flood of pre turned on packets. He's trying to make it sound worse than it is..
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@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
"Off" in television terms normally means that the logic is still on.
Sure, I know that, but the author didn't mention that the TV made a request before that flood of pre turned on packets. He's trying to make it sound worse than it is..
Maybe, or maybe he is trying to make it sound better than it is by leaving out that the TV made a DLNA request and opened ports on the firewall.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
"Off" in television terms normally means that the logic is still on.
Sure, I know that, but the author didn't mention that the TV made a request before that flood of pre turned on packets. He's trying to make it sound worse than it is..
Maybe, or maybe he is trying to make it sound better than it is by leaving out that the TV made a DLNA request and opened ports on the firewall.
OMG, I hadn't considered that - and it's entirely possible, na likely!
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Just creepy.
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I also prefer my TVs to be 'dumb' and in 2D. How many people cover up the cameras on their monitors or laptops? I don't
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@SeanExablox I worked at a place where everyone did. Every tablet, every laptop had their cameras taped over because everyone was convinced that the company was using the devices to spy on the employees. People would pull the batteries out of their Blackberries anytime they didn't need them to guarantee that the camera couldn't be turned on secretly.
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@scottalanmiller so that's a function of not trusting the company, not a 'boogey man' or the manufacturer spying on you.
Did everyone decorate their camera stickers
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@SeanExablox said:
@scottalanmiller so that's a function of not trusting the company, not a 'boogey man' or the manufacturer spying on you.
Did everyone decorate their camera stickers
Nope, just tape and white paper.
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@scottalanmiller said:
I prefer my TVs to be "dumb", just monitors.
Likewise. The same goes with cars, though I also feel this way because car and television manufacturers are pretty godawful at creating a good interface.
Last time I had a GPS device, the wanted $299 and a US shipping address to deliver the map update package, a digital asset. Why bother when the interface and maps are updated for free by Google?
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@julian my Jetta came with GPS, but I never use it. iPhone & Waze is the go to.
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Better and better - your voice traffic isn't even encrypted:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/02/17/samsung_smart_tv_privacy_rewind/
