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Sadly the “display devices” ship sailed a long time ago. Smart TVs were phoning this stuff home way back in 2013: https://doctorbeet.blogspot.com/2013/11/lg-sma

by Lammy 5y ago

Sadly the “display devices” ship sailed a long time ago. Smart TVs were phoning this stuff home way back in 2013: https://doctorbeet.blogspot.com/2013/11/lg-smart-tvs-logging-usb-filenames-and.html https://doctorbeet.blogspot.com/2013/11/lg-smart-tvs-logging... Of course that was just file names and TV tuner/input metadata like channel numbers, not even MusicBrainz/Shazam-style fingerprinting like they would probably be capable of these days with beefier SoCs and more widespread always-on connectivity. Files-on-USB are no longer “en vogue” anyway with everyone and everything moving to streaming services where the surveillance is built right in by definition. Every time I watch something on Netflix/Hulu/Disney they’re watching me right back even if it’s ostensibly for my benefit e.g. for more accurate recommendations.

coding123 5y ago
Well, the good news is that the vast majority of those monitors and TVs need a WIFI connection, which is optional to set up. However, unfortunately, we're on the cusp of devices having their own permanent mobile phone network connection. Rozzie can confirm.
- alpaca128 5y ago
  All they need is flip a few bytes in the software and all newly sold screens only work if they're registered with an active, unbanned and non-anonymous account and were online in the last 12 hours. And then you won't just get randomly banned from Facebook or Google with no human support staff to talk to, you'll also lose access to half your media devices. This is already true for Oculus/Facebook (and probably some others).
  - dane-pgp 5y ago
    > all newly sold screens only work if they're registered The other side of this pincer movement is to mandate that all devices which access the internet must send a remote attestation of their boot process, to check that you haven't "tampered" with them by installing your own OS or jailbreaking them.
rblatz 5y ago
No, they 100% have services that buy data from SmartTV manufacturers like Vizio and sells this data to advertisers to help track attribution and campaign effectiveness. A big one is iSpot.tv, the TV will use a fingerprint of your commercial and determine when/where it was watched, and help you tie back the attribution of a customer that visited your site.

by Lammy 5y ago

coding123 5y ago

Well, the good news is that the vast majority of those monitors and TVs need a WIFI connection, which is optional to set up. However, unfortunately, we're on the cusp of devices having their own permanent mobile phone network connection. Rozzie can confirm.

alpaca128 5y ago
All they need is flip a few bytes in the software and all newly sold screens only work if they're registered with an active, unbanned and non-anonymous account and were online in the last 12 hours. And then you won't just get randomly banned from Facebook or Google with no human support staff to talk to, you'll also lose access to half your media devices. This is already true for Oculus/Facebook (and probably some others).
- dane-pgp 5y ago
  > all newly sold screens only work if they're registered The other side of this pincer movement is to mandate that all devices which access the internet must send a remote attestation of their boot process, to check that you haven't "tampered" with them by installing your own OS or jailbreaking them.

rblatz 5y ago

No, they 100% have services that buy data from SmartTV manufacturers like Vizio and sells this data to advertisers to help track attribution and campaign effectiveness. A big one is iSpot.tv, the TV will use a fingerprint of your commercial and determine when/where it was watched, and help you tie back the attribution of a customer that visited your site.