Is privacy possible with smart TV?

I’d like to start a discussion about TV privacy in 2023. I’ve never been interested in having a TV, but recently I was thinking of getting one. Looking into it, the privacy implications seem horrible. All the major brands seem to have cameras, microphones, and content recognition software. I can’t believe how dystopian it is.

I also notice that most of the articles about this are from a few years ago. Are things better now? Do they still collect an Orwellian amount of data?

As I understand it, there are a few mitigation options:

  1. Leave it disconnected from the internet and use a separate device for streaming. But it sounds like some brands have incessant nag screens, or disable features until connected to the internet. I was looking into the Samsung Frame TV, but I’m not even sure you can use the art mode without internet. Does anyone know?
  2. Pi-hole set up with a blocklist. It’s disheartening that such a technical solution would be necessary.
  3. Get a commercial “dumb” display. These are more expensive, and usually thicker.
  4. Go through the menu and disable privacy violating settings. Does this work? I’m doubtful.

edit: Just to be clear, I am NOT talking about the normal sort of ad tracking that happens when you use streaming services. Netflix knows what you’re watching regardless of what device you use. I’m talking about stuff like a hidden camera recording your facial reactions, microphones recording your private conversations, and screen recording of your viewing activities. This is sci-fi dystopia level creepy.

possiblylinux127,

Try Kofi with a dumb tv

radau,

I have one of those cheap TCL Roku TVs, I think it was something like $130 for a 55 inch a few years ago on sale.

I put it on a VLAN then added a rule just for it to only ever allow communication to my Jellyfin server. No internet, no other devices, Wireless AP isolation, just able to access that port on that address.

It works ok but it does nag me that it’s not connected when opening Jellyfin, cheaper than adding a dedicated TV box to it though! I tried a similar setup with an old Fire TV and it really doesn’t like being “offline” like that and makes you navigate through the settings to open any of the apps.

If I were buying new I’d try to go for a monitor for sure, it’s just not worth all the potential issues.

vox,
@vox@sopuli.xyz avatar

get something like mi tv box and flash it with aosp

Skimmer, (edited )

The world of TV’s is pretty tricky for privacy right now, there’s a lot to say on it, so here’s my recommendations.

I recommend just getting any TV and disconnecting it from the internet, the brand shouldn’t matter. You can connect it to the internet every now and then to check for software updates (i.e. any bug fixes or new features being added), but for the most part I’d leave it fully offline, and would also recommend uninstalling any apps possible that are installed, to just speed up things, especially since we won’t be using them. All of the TV brands out there are pretty much equally bad for privacy, and will spy on you and collect and sell any data they can, and also built-in Smart TV’s just generally have very poor and slow performance, plus lack support for various codecs and formats, etc. So even besides privacy, built-in Smart TV’s are just a horrible experience and I really never recommend them and don’t see them worth using.

Now, you’ll need to obtain a streaming box to connect to your TV… so that you can actually consume content and use it. You have a few options as far as privacy goes.

  • Building/using your own PC, or using something like a Raspberry Pi, with Linux - This gives you the most control possible, but at the cost of being less convenient and requiring much more work to set-up and configure. You will be losing a lot of nice features like Dolby Vision with this approach as well, and will have to do some tinkering and configuring for sure, but overall it could be preferable to some people.
  • Apple TV 4K - Out of all the streaming boxes and sticks out there that you can buy, this is undeniably the most private out of the box. Its not a bad device in terms of specs and features (though there are better options for this as I will get to) … but it isn’t ideal though, as it is Apple after all. Despite being better than companies like Facebook and Google, Apple has definitely had some issues with things like privacy. Plus with an Apple device, you lose all freedom and control over it, you can’t even sideload apps on the Apple TV or install something like a VPN on it, plus OS and everything being closed source, etc. This is a hard recommendation for me for most people, but it could be ideal for people who want 0 tinkering or work, and just want something private out of the box that’s simple and easy. Though, I would certainly avoid it for the better options if possible.
  • NVIDIA Shield TV - This is what I personally use and would be my recommendation for most people. The specs and features of the device are essentially unparalleled to any other box out there, it even beats the Apple TV in terms of support for codecs and formats. For privacy… out of the box, the Shield is pretty horrible to say the least. Full of Google tracking and spying, and even requires a Google account on first set-up. The good thing is we can fix it. You have 2 options: Either install LineageOS (the Shield is officially supported) for the most privacy possible, or you can just keep the stock OS and use ADB to remove all Google apps and services, as well as any other bloatware and unwanted crap. The downside to Lineage is you lose Dolby Vision, AI Upscaling, and the App Switcher (so you can’t switch apps by double pressing the home button anymore), so for most people, if you go this route I would recommend just keeping stock and removing all of the BS through ADB (You can just use a random burner Google account for set-up). Isn’t 1000% ideal, but overall its really nice and seems to work well, while keeping privacy intact. You can also even use ADB to set a Private DNS, as well as disable connectivity checks (or change the server away from Google), so overall you can get a pretty nice set-up with this, its the best approach imo.
  • Dynalink TV Box - While I do recommend the Shield for most people, if its out of your price range and you aren’t willing to or can’t get it (though I can’t stress enough that it’s well worth it for what you get), then the Dynalink TV Box is the next best option imo. It officially supports LineageOS which can be installed, which is what I’d recommend doing if you go for this approach, since the lost features like AI Upscaling and Dolby Vision from the Shield are irrelevant since they aren’t present on the Dynalink box in the first place. This would give you great privacy if that’s the sole thing you’re after.

I’d avoid any other TV box out there besides the ones I just listed, as they all pretty much just spy on you and collect and sell your data, and there’s little to no gain or benefit that I see in using them over your built-in smart TV or any of the other options that exist.

I think overall these are the best recommendations and ways to be able to privately use a TV without it spying on you and phoning home any and everything you do on it. I do hope it gets easier and simpler in the future, but this is what we got for now.

Clymene,

Great detailed comment. My concern is that I’m not clear on whether the TV tries to collect data even without an internet connection, and sends the collected data if you ever connect it in the future (e.g. for a firmware update). It’s such a poorly regulated industry, I have no trust in the companies imposing any reasonable limits on their own behavior.

Skimmer,

This is a very fair concern.

However, the thing to consider is with these Smart TV’s, and generally poor privacy companies and devices, is that they’ll always use the lowest hanging fruit where possible. I’d say the amount of data that the device will go through the lengths to collect offline and later upload are quite low.

Most Smart TV’s collect data from when people directly use the Smart TV itself (i.e. what apps and content you directly watch and download on it as an example). The vast majority of people who buy TV’s like this will just use the built-in Smart TV for watching media and for doing everything on the device, without even giving it a second thought, so the manufacturers basically automatically win and get data on 99% of consumers, without really any effort or work.

For people like us who do care and go through the trouble of circumventing it (i.e. not using the built-in Smart TV at all, and disconnecting the TV entirely from the internet besides for updates occasionally), I’d say that only leaves 2 issues: listening through the mic (I think this is unlikely since voice recordings take up a lot of storage space, as well as bandwith to upload, and like I said in my first comment, TV manufacturers really cheap out on these devices and cut corners wherever possible, and back to my point of the low hanging fruit, but regardless, if you’re concerned, then removing the mics or taping them would certainly solve this), and recording or storing what you view through other inputs like your streaming box (again I feel this is unlikely for same reasons as voice recording, it’d take up a lot of space and bandwith, isn’t quite practical, and they typically focus on the low hanging fruit).

These are both possible concerns, but I’d say they’re realistically extremely unlikely, especially due to how much effort and work it would take to spy on such a small portion of people. The investment and the amount of work and effort needed to do this just doesn’t make sense and isn’t really justified for them. If you’re still concerned, then I’d recommend just putting your TV behind a VPN and putting it into a separate VLAN whenever you do connect or update it (and also just taping/removing the microphone like I said above), or of course if you’re extra paranoid, you can always just leave it fully offline and deal without updates. But I personally just don’t see it as a major risk or something to worry about.

There definitely needs to be regulations on these devices, its completely unacceptable in its current state. It shouldn’t be this hard to just get something like a TV without it spying on you and completely invading your privacy, but I guess that’s the world we live in now. :/

Clymene,

Right, these seem like reasonable hypotheses. I see a LOT of “innovation” happening in this space, though. In the future, or maybe even the present, I think it would be trivial to use speech to text and store conversations as small text files. Let’s say anytime it hears a specific brand name, “Cheerios” or “Toyota”, it records the conversation in a text file and sends it to marketers for research. It’s really not unthinkable.

The recent Mozilla report confirms that cars are using your microphone to determine what song or podcast you’re listening to, and listening to your conversations, so it’s not as if this is paranoid conjecture. If there’s money in it, and no rules to stop them, I think it’s almost inevitable.

I think automatic content recognition works by capturing still frames at strategic moments, so it may not take as much data as we think. For example, studios apparently hide watermarks that identify shows and movies. Then you would just need to make the tv detect the watermarks, not store and send screenshots of the screen. Then it can send a tiny CVS file of when and for how long you watched the show. It wouldn’t even need to know the name of the show. The watermark could be an alphanumeric code, and so even new shows would be detectable.

trippingonthewire,

I always wondered if I could install a private OS on a smart TV but never found one.

I like Android TVs because I can install f-droid apps on them. Like Cloudstream. I tried to debloat my TV by connecting my laptop to it and running the adb command to remove any bad apps I noticed, but even that’s not perfect.

I wanna become an android developer someday and I might look into developing privacy apps focused on Android TVs.

Edit: I removed google play and it’s services, so spyware shouldn’t be getting updates on my TV and I got it a few years ago now, I think it’s ok for privacy right now.

nick,

Bout 7 years ago I bought a Vizio tv because it was dumb; all the smart features were via a table it came with that chrome cast to the tv. I was reasonably happy with it.

Then in 2018 they pushed a firmware update that made it smart, and literally made the remote that came with the tv useless; you needed to buy a new one from them to use the tv. And naturally it was always out of stock.

Needless to say I won’t be buying a Vizio ever again. I just do LG tvs now, and don’t let them on the network; all streaming is via Apple TV.

Cwilliams,

I think you should look into Plasma Big screen

Starfish, (edited )

A german magazine just made a video on that topic. You can activate english subtitles.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBSEHpU-pyI
They tested a bunch of smart tvs and tv-sticks and their network activites.
They say that roku devices were the most privacy friendly tv-sticks.

And if you dont care about warranty voiding, open the tv and tape the things you dont want. Mic, cam, etc. Its probably the cheapest option

ReversalHatchery,

They say that roku devices were the most privacy friendly.

Really? I remember the exact opposite. Isn’t it the brand that requires you to connect the TV to internet (and maybe even register am account, but I’m not sure about that now) before you can use it for anything?

ScoobyDoo27,

Yeah, that seems odd. Wouldn’t the Apple TV be the most privacy friendly commercial streaming box?

Gonzako,

Why does a TV need a fucking camera?

couragethebravedog,

Hisense TVs come with a physical microphone switch that disables the mic. Idk if this is on the budget end of TVs but I paid about 1500 for mine and it has it.

Supervisor194,
@Supervisor194@lemmy.world avatar

I recently bought a not-smart TV, and it was cheaper than the smart ones. The brand is Sceptre, 65" 4K UHD and - I just checked - it is still selling for $378 at a popular American box retailer’s website who will remain unnamed. 75" is selling for $498.

I absolutely hate the software-ification of everything. It’s worse than worthless. Last TV I bought has held up for almost a decade now. It is 55" and it cost me almost $800, which was a steal at the time. I was kinda floored by the price of the new one, and the picture’s pretty sweet too.

ohwhatfollyisman,

you’re lucky. in my country one can’t get a dumb tv bigger than 32". nobody sells it. not online, not in brick and mortar stores.

ares35,
ares35 avatar

my tv is less than a year old. four firmware updates (allowed through the pihole to try to fix an audio bug.. but no luck there yet) so far and now the 'smart' bits are laggy and slow. the one app that i started to actually like over its web site can't handle more than a few hours now without freezing up (the tv needs to be restarted to 'fix'). it was fast and fine and could run for days on end before. at the rate its performance is deteriorating, it'll be unusable before its 2 year warranty is up.

which is all by design, i'm sure. yea, you might 'force' me into another tv, but you can't make me buy another one of your pieces of shit.

if it gets any worse, the tv is getting factory reset and never touching the net again. i might be able to salvage a few years out of it as a monitor before some cheap sub-component inside dies.

Clymene,

May I ask why you updated the firmware? I keep seeing people say that they disconnect the tv from the internet except for firmware updates, but if it works fine on day one and it’s always off line, why upgrade the firmware at all?

Research8165,

For the moment, I've settled with our TV staying disconnected. All the 'smart' features are managed by an Nvidia shield Pro with LineageOS.

dutchkimble,

Any downsides with lineage or all systems functional?

Research8165,

Some apps may complain about the lack of Google if you don't install Microg. But apart from that, been really happy. This was one of the last parts of my life I was waiting to properly degoogle.

Skimmer,

Yeah. In my testing on my Shield 2019 Pro, with Lineage, my biggest problems were:

  • No Dolby Vision
  • No AI Upscaling
  • No App Switcher (Could no longer double press the home button to switch apps)

There were also some other little bugs here and there, but those were my biggest problems with LineageOS over Stock, so I didn’t stick with it. I’m currently just using my Shield on Stock, but with all Google apps and other bloatware and garbage removed through ADB, and while not perfectly ideal, its been a good enough experience, and I think by far the best option currently for a TV box.

dutchkimble,

Ah great thanks for the response, I’m doing the same, stock with degoogling as much as possible. I end up using upscaling and the app switcher a lot so your reply has been most helpful for me to decide not to try lineage on it right now…

TheImpressiveX,
@TheImpressiveX@lemmy.ml avatar

I’ve said this before on Lemmy, but you may want to consider getting a projector instead. They (usually) don’t have any smart-capabilities or Internet connectivity, and with the right setup, the screen size can be bigger than even the biggest consumer TV on the market.

The cons are that you need to be in a dark room, and if you want a really good projector (which you will), it’ll be just as expensive, or even more expensive than buying a TV. Also projectors don’t have OLED.

dvb,
@dvb@lemmy.ml avatar

Unfortunately, that no longer seems to be the case. I just did a research and almost all projectors that came into question for me now also have smart features.

Clymene,

I think projectors are great. In fact, I currently have one. But there are lots of trade offs. They’re big and take up lots of space, especially the good ones. Placement can be awkward even if you get a short throw, unless you ceiling mount, which isn’t always practical. Relatedly, it can be a pain to hook up to sound because the projector is in the back while you need sound from the front. Image quality can be decent but is still way worse than pretty much all modern TVs. (I hear laser projectors kinda fix this but they’re even more expensive.) It doesn’t turn on instantly; there’s typically a significant warm up period for the lamp. Some units have a noisy fan because the lamp produces a lot of heat. You need a large clear wall space or a rollable screen. I think there’s a reason why projectors are typically in movie rooms and not for more casual spaces.

All this to say, projectors are great but not for all contexts. I wish the decision to get a projector and the decision to get a privacy respecting device were two completely unrelated decisions.

Infinite_Indecision,
@Infinite_Indecision@midwest.social avatar

TV left offline. Small computer(I use linux) attached. Wireless keyboard with a trackpad.

I’ve been doing this for years.

Ozzy,

And how do you handle cable, if you have that is. Or do you use IPTV?

Infinite_Indecision,
@Infinite_Indecision@midwest.social avatar

100% streaming on the web

electromage,

I saw a story a while back about Smart TVs automatically connecting to open WiFi networks to phone home even without the user configuring anything.

Infinite_Indecision,
@Infinite_Indecision@midwest.social avatar

There are no open connections around me unless they have an agreement with a cell carier

jsdz,

Don’t ever trust a “smart” TV until you’ve installed Linux on it. All of the ones I’ve bought so far (the cheapest available at Wal-Mart, usually) are willing to display things without ever having been allowed a network connection. If you manage to buy one that isn’t, return it and complain vigorously.

Clymene, (edited )

It didn’t cross my mind that I could run Linux on a tv. (I figured, however, that the pre-installed software is built on Linux.) Are you talking about something like LinuxTV.org

iHUNTcriminals,

You can use a shotgun to hard jailbreak it.

ganymede,

nearly asked you for a tutorial, then re-read lolol…

takeda,

shotgun_aarch64_arm_explodit, you never used it?

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