we live in hell
I don’t even understand the pitch? you have the disc playing, in your hands, your ownership, no buffering, no subscription required. and they’re saying…hey do you want a worse experience?
This is called Automatic Content Recognition and it can be disabled in the settings, highly recommend doing that. It should have asked you whether you wanted it enabled when you set up the TV, as it’s legally required to be opt-in in the US opposed to opt-out. Since you’re using a Roku Smart TV, it specifically is taking two full resolution “video snapshots” every second.
"To disable ACR on a Roku TV, the privacy policy says to “visit your Roku TV’s Settings menu (Settings > Privacy > Smart TV Experience) and de-select 'Use Info from TV Inputs.”
'Use Info from TV Inputs.”
Well that is an incredibly misleading name that sounds like something I would want to keep enabled.
Since you’re using a Roku Smart TV, it specifically is taking two full resolution “video snapshots” every second.
“Got a data cap? Ha ha, fuck you.” – Roku
I haven’t done any research into what’s actually being transmitted, but I assume ACR feeds the snapshots into an ASIC that does something akin to perceptual hashing, then sends a chain of hashes collected over something like a 2-4sec window to an edge server for matching. So perhaps around 24kbps is actually being transmitted.
Since you’re using a Roku Smart TV
That link also works for other TV brands. Just scroll to the top of the article to find your TV section.
Where I live, it’s usual practice to get the vendor to send a team to your house to do the unboxing and installation of expensive TVs so it’s easier to deal with doa products and whatnot. When the guys came in to set up my LG oled, I watched in horror as they speed ran the setup wizard, checking all the boxes and giving my consent to every single tracking feature without even telling me anything. I had to go back and redo everything once they’d fucked off.
Part of me can’t believe that I’m saying this, but I really hope you filed a complaint just so the installation service provider can be informed that this is an issue and hopefully advise the installers that they should always seek customer input on that kind of thing, it shouldn’t add much time to the installation.
I get that they’re just trying to get it done quickly, but customer service is paramount.
This is why my TV does not have internet access.
I really don’t get why you would allow your tv Internet access anyways. A huge number of them carry tons of spyware that not only is on the TV but creates backdoors into your network.
Source on backdoors?
https://www.techfocus24.com/tcl-smart-tvs-may-have-chinese-backdoor-research/
I have a TCL even, but it’s not allowed on my wifi network at all. Have its Mac addy blocked, all my smart TVs are blocked. Wish they sold more non smart TV’s these days.
It seems like these are standard vulnerabilities that were patched. Happens all the time, especially with open source packages like Android
Some TVs automatically latch on to any open network they can find, to do their connected thing, even if you don’t specifically give them access to your wifi.
Mr soldering iron fixes that easy enough good luck connecting to anything without a working antenna.
Your wifi shouldn’t be open anyways, hell I live in the middle of nowhere and my Wi-Fi network is locked.
I think you missed the point. It isn’t about your network or what good security practices are, it’s about what the TV does or is trying to do if you don’t connect it to your wifi. Open networks are out there whether we like it or not and some TVs will try to use them to call home.
Anytime you see the word “smart” in the name of the product, remember to mentally replace the word “smart” with “tracking”.
“Ad enabled”
Same with IoT
The S in IoT stands for security, and the P stands for privacy.
😂😂😂
See the problem is that you let a display device connect to the internet
Connected a Samsung smart TV to my network when we first got it. The thing damn-near crashed my pi-hole asking for so many ad/tracking domains. Factory reset it later that same day. I think my % of requests blocked went from 15% to 68% in just the 3 hours or so the Smart TV was connected.
They started to wisen up and hard-coded dns requests to 8.8.8.8 to bypass dns ad blockers now. Heck, some apps like Netflix already do it for years now. If your router can transparently redirect all dns requests to your pi-hole, you should use that feature.
So they recognize that the owner of the product is trying to prevent them from collecting data, and actively try to circumvent the owner’s security measures? This shit should be illegal, and carry a huge fine. You paid for the device, and it’s connected to your network, which you control. I’m sick and tired of corporations thinking it’s totally okay to be straight-up spyware and adware. Some supposedly legitimate companies these days make old-school computer viruses look down right respectful.
Not only that, I have the entire Roku domain blocked on my network, and even though there’s no reason for it, as evidenced by the fact that there’s no problem running it for a month, and it doesn’t happen to all TVs, depending when it was last handled, it breaks my Plex app every 30 days in such a way that it needs to be fully reinstalled, which requires unblocking Roku, allowing phone home of the prior month’s data. Old, but not obsolete, app versions should still work fine - have a kodi Plex app that hasn’t been updated in years and that works without issue. So this is absolutely an intentional choice to force users to at least cough up their viewing data, even if they can’t give you their ads. And they can collect a surprising amount of information through those apps.
Took me a couple months to figure out what was happening (by waiting 2 months and doing the reinstall on the same day for all of them and checking the next time one broke, then staggering them the next time) but I’m no longer using the apps and will probably just factory reset all three of them, leave them off the network entirely.
The amount of work they do as a company to make my private experience complete shit because I don’t want them invasively collecting my info and shoving ads down my throat… is absolutely disgusting.
Remember Bonzi Buddy? I bet lil’ purple monke sent less snoop data than big purple roku.
It’s the MOST blocked thing in Pi-Hole on my entire network!
I deny all DNS traffic except traffic going to my router IP so my pfBlocker will always work.
There’s always DNS over HTTPS. It’s really hard to nab that shit out if it’s going upstream to the same server that’s hosting the content.
That’s my next project now that I have my pihole set up. My basic ass router from my ISP does not support that though.
Side question: do you know of any openWRT supported routers in the $100-150 range with external antennas? Everything I’ve taken a look at is either an internal antenna, or like $400.
What do you mean with internal/external antenna? Does something like asus rt-ax53u ($85) counts as having external antennas? https://openwrt.org/toh/asus/rt-ax53u
Yeah. That’s perfect. Thanks!
I recall having similar issues with Chrome. Instead of checking in with the pihole, it just went ahead and bypassed it by using a different DNS.
goolag dns
or use the blocking feature of your firewall. Here’s Roku being persistent and ignoring my pihole. Firewalla for the win.
Yep - this. I absolutely abhor “smart” TVs for just this reason.
But, even lack of internet sometimes isn’t enough. I recently, and inadvertently, left the wireless adapter on my TV enabled, after having to temporarily join it to my wireless for a firmware update (digital TV tuning needed updating for my region). After I was done, I cleared the wireless config, but I didn’t think to go into the other menu where you can entirely disable the wireless adapter.
Little did I realise that meant the TV started broadcasting its own SSID, for friggin’ Apple Airplay or some other shit. I found this out when my 9yo daughter was suddenly exposed to some adult content for about 10 seconds. Best guess is a nearby neighbour mistook my TV for theirs.
I’ve obviously disabled the wireless adapter again, but this has been a terribly difficult lesson I’ve had to learn.
For anyone concerned, my daughter is OK. My wife had a good chat with her about it. She had considerably more talking down to do with me - I was ready to start knocking on doors, to have my own chat.
I work in IT at a fitness center and we have TVs in front of the treadmills. They are not enterprise TVs, just standard Samsung TVs. Above the treadmills, we have a conference room. After setting up a conference room with wireless screen sharing, I found that all of the TV’s below show up when trying to cast. Obviously I tried to disable them, but there is no way to do so outside of physically ripping out the antenna. I called support and everything. Why the fuck was that decision made
Yeah - I had to dig around in my Samsung to find it. Under Settings | Network | Expert there’s a radio button labelled Wireless. Disabling that turns wireless off completely. Mine’s a 65" Q60A QLED 4K bought in 2021. Same on my Samsung 43" in the bedroom, so seems fairly common across the models, at least in the Q range.
Sounds like the next conference you are going to have in that room is with the Supervisor or the CEO about either downgrading that shit and have everything wired instead, or physically ripping out the antenna is going to happen.
Lol it’s a nonprofit, shit ain’t gonna happen
No, the fault is with the people who make the TV. It’s not the customers fault that other people are evil.
It’s kinda both. Like, if I walk up to someone on the street who says they’re gonna stab me, the fault is obviously on them for stabbing me, but at the same time I got exactly what he said I’d get
My TV is connected to the Internet and doesn’t do this. There’s a setting to turn it off.
Mine doesn’t have anything like this and is connected to the internet, no settings to change either. LG Oled
I have an LG OLED too. There’s a setting for recommended content, or something like that. I turned anything off that looked like it meant ads or tracking.
All new Roku devices do that, even if it’s not a Roku tv. Roku went from one of the best video devices to the worst in one fell swoop. Literally the only good off the shelf device is the Apple TV.
My Roku TV will be in a landfill before I allow it to send 1s and 0s through anything but the HDMI cord
How does it stream things/what’s the point of a Roku if it’s not connected to the Internet?
roku tv
roku manufacturers 🤓 📺 in addition to streaming devices
I feel like I’m explaining how you use a screen without touching it. Is this what it’s like to be old?
You use HDMI. There are ports on the side of the device that allow video input from devices like computers and Xboxes. I use my computer and Xbox to watch Youtube and TV shows.
If you’re asking why I have a smart TV instead of a dumb TV, that’s because we live in 2023 and finding a TV without a wifi adapter is like finding a phone without a blighted notch
Ah, for some reason I thought you were referring to a Roku stick/box, not a smart TV, my mistake 👍.
It will still be connected to the Internet via the HDMI cord.
I’m unaware of any widely adopted use of HEC. Certainly none of the modern consoles use HEC, and I don’t think my smart TV is compatible with it either
More like everything will be in a landfill before you allow it to send 1s and 0s through anything but the HDMI cord.
I let my Xbox send 1s and 0s through the ethernet cable
I prefer the Nvidia shield over Apple TV. It supports direct streaming of Dolby Vision/Atmos on Plex. Pretty sure the Apple TV is missing some key codecs.
Infuse fills in the gaps. Don’t even need a plex server anymore (it works better imho)
And this is why we buy dumb TVs
Where? Which ones?
Btw, my LG tv would be able to stream from my phone, if the app didn’t accuse me of unsupported rooting, because i have no Play Services running.
A quick search gave me this: https://www.makeuseof.com/best-dumb-tvs/
I might save up and pick up one of the 32" ones after the holidays.
The fact that the site refuses to let me read the article because I have an ad blocker is some very dark humor.
Disable all scripts (inline too) in the adblocker and it works, lol.
When looking at options, search for “monitors” instead of TVs.
Just unplug it from the internet
That won’t be the solution forever. They’ll put an always online requirement soon.
Commercial signage displays it is then.
Don’t by a tv, buy a monitor
Yes! got any recommendations because people are searching for dumb tvs and can’t seem to find them anywhere.
You probably want commercial displays. They’ll cost a bit more, but they’re also designed to run 24/7 (think the screens they use in menus, signs, etc) so they could probably last forever as a TV.
So you’re saying I need a commerical display to display less commercials?
Do you have a suggestion for one with HDR or that runs a proper refresh rate and response time. There are a few good options for NEC but they’re about 15 grand.
That doesn’t exist apart from very expensive business screens.
Now that is some serious privacy invading.
You like this episode of Futurama. Would you also like to watch this episode of Futurama?
We noticed you found a way to watch this episode without ads. We suggest watching it from one of our providers so they get a cut.
I love when i buy a new bottom bracket from cycling webshop x.
After i finish the payment and move to a different website the ad there is that same bottom bracket again from cycling webshop x.
Do they not understand it’s a waste of space?
It’s the amazon approach. You bought these jeans. Wanna buy them again?
We need a Lemmy community dedicated to find, repair and exchange dumb TV. These are become increasingly rare and increasingly needed.
Look for digital signage if you want one with a lot of input options and a guarantee it will do only what you tell it to do (they are however more expensive than consumer grade models)
Just don’t connect smart TVs to the internet and boom, dumb TV.
Except my old TV would still try to load ads even though it wasn’t connected to the Internet. Made it run slow as shit. When the screen died conveniently right after the warranty period, I just switched to using a monitor to watch stuff.
Dang that sucks! What brand was it so I can avoid it?
Samsung.
If my TV is full of functionnality I don’t want, I called it bloated. And I don’t like bloated TV more than smart TV.
I appreciate the ECO ramifications. But it’s a hell of a lot easier just to firewall the smart ones. I suspect even a pihole might be enough
deleted by creator
Dude I want a 34" wega so bad but they’re ridonculously expensive
Maybe someone will get the idea to start !dumbtvsarewanted@lemmy.world for that and it could end up going as far as being dedicated to find, repair and exchange CRT TV as well.
What should it be called?
Simple TV Exchange
Dumb is the new smart
Be smart, buy dumbidk, I’m sure we could find better.
When my parents’ “dumb” LG TV became faulty, I asked them to keep it so I could repair it and use it myself.
Best decision ever. The issue was just down to a dodgy connection to the LCD panel, just needed a thin shim material in there and the issue was solved. I added a fan in there too since it gets really hot, and also now run it on the lowest brightness (which is still pretty visible during daytime) since the old CCFL backlights kick out a ton more heat when cranked up
It’s just over a decade old now and still going strong, currently hooked up to a Steam Link in the bedroom for streaming from other machines in the house, a Miracast/EZCast HDMI dongle for casting from my phone, and finally to my PS2.
on my TV
good joke
The SMART thing to do is to buy a DUMB TV. Pay a little more and get a real TV- you know. A display, with speakers and HDMI inputs. Nothing else.
Sometimes you have to be a bit more pragmatic. I’m not aware of any TV with HDR, Dolby Vision, OLED, etc. that isn’t smart and reasonably priced. Your best bet is to buy a smart TV and block Internet access.
Another thing you can do is visit the selfhosted subs and they can help you out with other things like pihole for blocking ads and intrusive network activity on your home network.
Getting pihole set up may just be my new year’s resolution.
Yep, most of them won’t complain if you just never connect them to Wi-Fi during setup.
I have never had any smart TV complain (yet) that I have never once connected wifi. I am guessing there would be lawsuits, that a physical device requiring internet and requiring you to connect it just to function, would get sued in a class action of some kind. I use other connection systems via HDMI to transcode media, and even people who still want TV do not need to connect the TV itself to wifi, since it should all come over through HDMI ideally (or DP or whatever cables it may be.)
You’re going to love this free tv then. It’s free, and people has began receiving this tv since the last 3 months or so. In exchange for receiving this free tv, you’ll have to make some sacrifice:
- The tv must be connected to internet at all times within 5 days of receiving it. You aren’t allowed to disconnect it (except due to brief internet outages)
- There is a second screen on the bottom with camera that display ads. You aren’t allowed to obscure the second screen to hide ads.
- No modification allowed. You can’t disconnect the second screen.
- You aren’t allowed to block ads, even with pihole.
Breaking the ToS means your credit card would get charged $1000. Very fun TV.
This may not be a popular opinion, but I personally see no issue with this if the terms of service and use are made clear and transparent before you order the device. Would I personally recommend or use the product? Hell no, but people having an informed choice, and choosing to accept these terms is perfectly fine imo.
I agree with you. Instead of spending money to buy a smart tv and still getting ads and your data collected, I can see the appeal of paying $0 to get a smart tv riddled with ads and data collection. At least you’re not paying any money for the device. I just wish the opposite is also possible where you can buy a smart tv with zero ads and data collection.
I read 1984. It just took us a little longer to get there.
It does all those things because you explicitly agree to it before getting the TV. Not the same as paying outright for a TV that somehow needs a constant connection.
That all looks absolutely horrific, but clearly they have some customers somehow?
This is…dystopian…
This is what’s up. Buy a small Intel NUC, a USB-C combo Blueray & DVD player, and watch any service / play any content without the ridiculousness.
Spectres are reasonable TVs. Screen tech hasn’t improved drastically for the last few years, and streaming quality hasn’t had any major facelifts outside the frameworks we know and love – don’t let anyone fool you otherwise. Netflix, Hulu, Prime, etc., all stream comparably to one another.
Or just don’t connect the smart TV to the Internet.
Lol that’s my exact tv!
Or jailbreak your smart tv.
Underrated answer
Can’t you just not connect it to the Internet?
Not anymore bud
Yes you can. It won’t update and send info anymore
“He says ‘he’s already got one!’”
Why the F does it require a captcha to go to an Amazon page? I have no idea what you are trying to show, because I’m not doing that.
Sounds like a “you” problem, like you have a VPN connected.
Nope, vanilla Firefox, no firewall no VPN or other fancy stuff.
Drink verification can, peasant.
Disable ACR on your TV. There was a news report that came out last week about this very thing.
Also never connect it to the Internet
Dumb tv with the latest panel tech is too much to ask for these days too.
this is one major reason i switched to a projector. The “smart” malware trend has not caught up to home cinema projectors
Almost every TV is a perfectly good dumb TV when it doesn’t know your wifi password.
Seriously… Like just don’t connect it to the Internet? I dont know how it works when you don’t have a PC though, it’s easy for me to say don’t connect it because my PC is what gets the data im watching. Maybe these people only have a smart TV so that they can watch streaming services with it.
Don’t look for TVs, look for PC monitors or industrial displays
While I agree with you these practices do bring prices down for consumers. I just have the TV off internet and use an AppleTV.
But the prices being so low is exactly what makes people care less about things like privacy, so not great either
The comments suggesting the system sends 2 screenshots a second is truly worrying.
It might take 2 screenshots a second, but I suspect that will be hashed in some way, even if just to save their on incoming bandwidth rather than for privacy reasons.
It’s still fucking absolute bullshit though, and has at least told me that anything with Roku written on it is well worth avoiding.
See this shit. They’re fucking proud of it.
That looks like an advertisement to advertisers though so they would want to be proud of it.
Roku:“money money money fuck the user money money fuck privacy money! Who cares that they paid for the device and the content money money money!!”
Advertisers: “OMG! Money money fuck the user! Money money money!”
Funny and true
“Building audiences for activation” sounds like they’re planning to just activate a sleeper army to execute dastardly plans with a highly specific Activia commercial.
It’s crazy how marketer-speak sounds like PR-friendly Saturday Morning bad guys.
Well I guess that explains why my Roku TV is the worst culprit for hammering my pihole… Holy shit.
hammering my pihole
giggity
It’s called “Post-Purchase Monetization”, and it’s why your 65” OLED tv is so cheap. They capture and sell your viewing data - but only if you hook it up to an internet connection. So don’t hook them up to an internet connection.
Bro they dont have buttons and dont even let you change channels without logging on first with youf full social credit its mad world
and it’s why your 65” OLED tv is so cheap.
If this were true, the few remaining “dumb TVs” (e.g. from
SpectreSceptre) wouldn’t be cost-competitive, but they are.This abusive shit isn’t subsidizing the cost of the TV; it’s just padding the manufacturer’s profits.
Edit: the company isn’t named after the villainous org from James Bond
Spectre TVs are cheap because they compete at a lower tier and are priced to attract buyers to what is essentially an unknown brand.
Unless they’re also giving up important quality/features (other than the “smart” misfeature, that is), I don’t see how that matters.
The question is how long that will help. Just recently read about the first TVs popping up that try to connect to any available open WiFi to phone home, regardless of your settings. Soon our TVs will need tinfoil hats 😱
Stop spreading unsubstantiated bullshit. Cite a source or GTFO. There’s no way this would be legal since you have to agree to an EULA for them to spy on you. It’s the first thing you see when you start enabling WiFi on a smart TV.
Just because some idiot on the internet said its possible doesn’t count as evidence that companies are doing it. They’re smarter than that and they know they’ll get sued if they do it. They wouldn’t take that risk when 99% of smart TV owners agree to the EULA and enable the smart features themselves.
I have been searching for the source, but can’t find it anymore between all the WiFi troubleshooting sites. It wasn’t really brand stuff they mentioned but cheapo TV clones they checked for security risks, similar to those Trojan horse Android TV boxes.
But wouldn’t be the first time that the industry takes inspiration from something like that and either implements it silently to get the juicy telemetry (yes, using that to enable smart features would be dumb) or sells it as a ‘feature’.
mine doesn’t do this fortunately, but once in a while when you turn it on when it isn’t connected to wifi, it will bring you to a wifi selection screen instead of your last input, and the list is sorted so that unsecured APs are at the top, and the OK button highlight (which you’d normally use to activate the feed from your last source when you turn it on) just so happens to activate the top unsecured AP, to which it will immediately connect and launch into the “internet connected” onboarding process.
this almost happened to me once when I first got it… so I set up an AP on my router that has all traffic completely blocked, and connected the TV to that. it periodically tells me to call support about internet problems, but all the nags and promos and “sign in” begs went away otherwise, so I guess it’s just happy to hear from my router.
Jesus, really? That’s dismaying. Any chance you got a link?
I couldn’t find it again, sorry. But it wasn’t any real brand that did this (yet), but cheap noname TV clones (similar to those Trojan horse android boxes). Not something you’d trust anyway, but didn’t expect them trying to bridge the gap to get telemetry.
Yeah, seriously, that’s deeply sketchy if your TV basically starts trying to exploit your neighbor’s WiFi the second you plug it in. Wtf.
