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Samsung remotely disables TVs looted from South African warehouse

• lmilcin 5y ago
  I worked for Samsung. Let's just say, I am not letting any "smart" TVs in my home. Given choice of "smart" TV vs no TV, I choose no TV. Currently I have an old 30" monitor filling the function of the TV. I would love to have nice shiny screen, but the price is just too high.
  • atok1 5y ago
    Insight into how bad the TV is spying on us?
  • arriu 5y ago
    Can you block samsung.com at the DNS level and be alright or do the issues go deeper than that? Honest question as I don't have a Samsung tv...
    • grosswait 5y ago
      How about never connecting it to a network?
      • gorbypark 5y ago
        I once had a Samsung smart TV that was on the lower end of the price scale. It had Ethernet but no Wi-Fi (this was back in 2014ish so wifi was a “premium” feature). I didn’t have an Ethernet drop near the TV so I bought a USB wifi dongle and used that. A year or two later I was messing around with a Raspberry Pi and needed a wifi dongle, so I took the one from the TV. Lo and behold the smart tv features kept working. It must have had wifi hardware that was disabled in software and the wifi dongle somehow tricked it into working…long story to say that I bet with 5G TVs will start phoning home and nothing short of a faraday cage will be able to stop it.
      • rgoulter 5y ago
        I've seen comments report that it gets ethernet over HDMI if they plug in their internet-connected gaming console.
        • detaro 5y ago
          This is one of these things were people once heard that it's in the standard and then are convinced its happening, but nobody can ever name a single device that supports it. (Happy to be proven wrong though, but for now this seems to be pretty much FUD)
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
• stevespang 5y ago
  Wait till they develop "smart" monitors for computers ? Where ALL monitors on the market serve ads and spew endless garbage, Samsung will likely be the leader in that debauchery
• aaron695 5y ago
  > reinstated once proof of purchase and a valid TV license So they will start disabling TV's for the government when the yearly TV licences expire next? TV's drive economic growth and social welfare, they network communities quite effectively. Having TV license's in a country like South Africa is the definition of stupid. Lucky they have the internet and Facebook to turn to now. Maybe that will help the 44% (Including the ones who have given up) unemployment rate - https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2021/8/24/south-africas-unemployment-rate-is-now-the-worlds-highest https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2021/8/24/south-africas-un... But to be on-topic as a rich person running a Linux server I too are outraged people still buy/steal smart TV's
• MisterBastahrd 5y ago
  Gonna be a lot of fun one day when hackers target out-of-maintenance but otherwise fully functional devices one day and the manufacturers make the decision to brick them in order to save money then pretend like nothing happened.
• anothernewdude 5y ago
  Who lets TVs connect to the internet?
• ezekiel68 5y ago
  Jack a bunch of smart TVs from a warehouse and nobody panics. Because -- it's all part of "the plan". But if a company reaches out across the 'net and disables their stolen contraband; everybody LOSES THEIR MINDS!
  • emikulic 5y ago
    It's not about the TVs, it's about sending a message.
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• ZDurmPhoto 5y ago
  I'm probably just old and grumpy, but I ditched my newer smart TV's and moved to projectors. Last night I watched Altman's "The Long Goodbye" (1973) at around 120 inches on wall that has been skim coated and painted white. It looked like actual film with grainy night scenes and a muted color palette. It is a "dumb" projector and I love it. I love the experience of it. I also love the fact that this little projector can go in a drawer when not in use. No black mirror dominating a room. It also means I don't really watch much until near dark which for me makes it a little more special. I actually have to wait for the optimum conditions to enjoy (the horror!) I walked into Costco a few days ago and the new TV's are always near the entrance. Colors are saturated to cartoon levels, motion is 'smoothed' and HDR looks weird. It looks less and less like anything relating to human vision. I'm clearly bucking the trend since I'm guessing all these TV's are hot sellers.
• mark_l_watson 5y ago
  I gave away our SmartTV several months ago, and bought a dumb TV that is basically a cheap monitor with one HDMI input that we plug an Apple TV box into. I love this setup, but we don’t have the same hires quality display. I would like SmartTVs a little bit, if they had secure operating system with good security updates, but I don’t think that they do. Our Apple TV box does get frequent software updates, and we don’t have to deal with being marketed to (pushing apps, etc.).
• crackercrews 5y ago
  > Should a customer’s TV be incorrectly blocked, the functionality can be reinstated once proof of purchase and a valid TV license is shared to serv.manager@samsung.com So if you can't find your receipt, you're SOL?
  • SilverRed 5y ago
    Proof of purchase can usually be obtained from the store if you give them the time of the transaction which would be saved by your bank.
• malikNF 5y ago
  They mention TV license is needed to reactive the device if it stops working, and I remember back when I was in uni they told us we need to have a TV license to watch TV in the U.K. So I am wondering would this mean any government that wants to collect money for people watching TV, Samsung TVs will provide these gov with the power to do TV licensing automatically?
• zeroimpl 5y ago
  Remotely disabling stolen internet-connected devices is good common practice. We used this once at my company for some items which inexplicably went missing from the manufacturing line. A few years later I got a support ticket escalation about a customer who got a device from “some weird turn of events” (something like that) and couldn’t figure out how to activate it, it kept saying to contact support.
• Igelau 5y ago
  > Should a customer’s TV be incorrectly blocked, the functionality can be reinstated once proof of purchase and a valid TV license is shared What the hell is TV license?
  • tsjq 5y ago
    "In the British Islands, any household watching or recording live television transmissions at the same time they are being broadcast is required by law to hold a television licence. This applies regardless of transmission method, including terrestrial, satellite, cable, or for BBC iPlayer internet streaming. The television licence is the instrument used to raise revenue to fund the BBC; it is a form of taxation" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_licensing_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_licensing_in_the_Un...
    • denni9th 5y ago
      The TV license in the article is for a similar system in South Africa, which funds the local public broadcaster SABC
• forgithubs 5y ago
  This paradigm both scare and impress me.
• forgithubs 5y ago
  This paradigm scare and impress me.
• gigatexal 5y ago
  Remember when TVs did one thing well and one thing only?
• sebyx07 5y ago
  I use my smart tvs as monitors, I got a small 2nd hand pc for each of them with a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse. No rules, no restrictions, no ads
• Animats 5y ago
  Instead of disabling them, they should let them operate, but play only ads.
• icanhackit 5y ago
  Would be an interesting situation if someone bricked a large chunk of internet connected TV's. It would possibly drive the mainstream population towards greater internet security. (generous assumption?)
• gamesbrainiac 5y ago
  I also swore to never buy Samsung, after they messed up the Samsung Galaxy Tab S3. But then, I bought the S7, because they made a lot of improvements. In the end, I'm happy with the purchase, because I got it at a massive discount. However, I am still weary of Samsung devices in general. Also, the iPad just didn't do it for me. I prefer the S-Pen to the Apple Pencil.
• zzo38computer 5y ago
  The one feature I like better of the Samsung TV is the picture setting menu, which seems to have more options than the other one (although there is still room for improvement; I would design it very differently, with settings for YIQ->RGB matrix, RGB->RGB matrix, deinterlace mode, YIQ bandwidth, etc). Still, I don't use a smart TV; I have the older one. Even a while ago I had used a computer monitor as the TV set; it is smaller than a TV set but I don't mind. It is also faster than a smart TV set which is too slow. What I think should be want on the TV display is only: Digi-RGB video and analog audio input, IMIDI interface for control, picture setting, 4:3 aspect ratio (I dislike the wide screen), and a remote control with numbers. It shouldn't do more; the other features (including tuner) could be implemented in a VCR/DVD with FOSS, so that you can modify the program by yourself and adjust according to your intention. About remotely disabling TV sets, will they use it to violate the right of first sale? (Is that even how it works? I don't really know)
• cyansmoker 5y ago
  "The functionality can be reinstated once proof of purchase *and a valid TV license* is shared" What.
• sschueller 5y ago
  Samsung should be permitted to have something like this until the unit is sold. Once it is sold it is no longer theirs and any of these blocking features should be removed unless explicitly re-added buy the new owner. In fact why don't they charge extra for such a feature?
• kybernetikos 5y ago
  When I was young, you could steal a TV, or a VHS or CD or DVD collection, or a phone or (a little later) a GPS or media unit in a car or books. Now almost everything can be remotely disabled, and nobody really owns anything anyway, they just pay for subscriptions to things. I wonder what it does to society if crime becomes effectively impossible. A lot of writers have suggested that some level of deviance is essential for a healthy society.
  • SilverRed 5y ago
    It's an interesting question. Some kinds of crime do seem necessary since many things we consider essential human rights or at least harmless were once criminal. But I can't imagine this applies much to theft. I can't ever imagine a society where we are worse off because people couldn't steal TVs. And anything where it might make sense, a protest against the government in general would be more appropriate.
• mc32 5y ago
  On the one hand this is understandable and sort of "evil genius", on the other hand, this will also affect grey market buyers who cannot produce a legitimate receipt. It's also problematic because this means they can alter your property at will.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  • argomo 5y ago
    Yep. This hurts all SmartTV owners because it lowers the resale value of their property. Buyers have to stick to official retailers or risk getting a product that will be remotely bricked.
• josephcsible 5y ago
  This technology was used for good this time, but there's nothing stopping it from being used for evil next time. The fact that Samsung is even capable of doing this means you don't have control over your Samsung TV even if you do own it legally.
  • toomuchtodo 5y ago
    At least they’re not scanning your media library against a list of hashes yet. Edit: Ahh, I see from the replies I have had my fill of curiosity for the day.
    • deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    • majormajor 5y ago
      They are, they're just doing it for advertising, not piracy prevention. https://www.samsung.com/us/business/samsungads/resources/tv-ad-retargeting/ https://www.samsung.com/us/business/samsungads/resources/tv-...
      • netr0ute 5y ago
        That's why you never connect any smart TV to your network and instead use a standalone device combined with a PiHole.
        • BeefySwain 5y ago
          This only works until every "smart" device has a cellular modem built in.
          • netr0ute 5y ago
            Who pays for the cellular plans?
            • 5y ago
• anshumankmr 5y ago
  I am quite ambivalent to this feature. On one hand, if someone steals your TV, you can deactivate it. But now there is also a benefit to having a dumb TV. Imagine if you have too old of a model, so Samsung decides to remotely disable your TV.
  • polskibus 5y ago
    While not the same, crippling of Smart TVs already exists - their apps become incompatible with latest youtube, netflix, etc. APIs and therefore become less usable. You can get away from that with a smart stick, but then, you could've bought dumb tv instead.
  • post_break 5y ago
    My samsung TV was never connected to the internet. I didnt even accept the user agreement, it still works just fine.
    • CedarMadness 5y ago
      Just wait until they include Amazon Sidewalk, so the TV can connect using your neighbor's internet connection to download the latest ads.
      • bob1029 5y ago
        Physically eliminating the RF capabilities of a device without impacting the rest of its functions is usually feasible with enough patience. Your options include blocking external radiation (add copper mesh/foil), or destroying the device's antennas.
        • kuschku 5y ago
          Modern TVs come with remotes that only work via Bluetooth, not via IR, and which are required for using the TV.
        • sodality2 5y ago
• mam3 5y ago
  This is bad.
  • throwaway1777 5y ago
    Please elaborate. These kind of comments don’t really belong on hacker news without more content.
    • mam3 5y ago
      If youd actually browse HN you would know. One less step away from full ownership of your own devices and one more toward the consumer even more dependent on the compagnies. Who cares about a bunch of stolen TVs ?
• dilippkumar 5y ago
  > The blocking will come into effect when the user of a stolen television connects to the internet, in order to operate the television I purchased a Sony TV in 2019 after giving up on looking for 70" "dumb" television sets that would only connect to my PlayStation and act as a screen. I decided that I would buy a smart tv but never connect it to the internet. Every few days when I start my TV, I get an annoying "set up your Android TV" prompt that takes over my TV. I have to grab my remote and dismiss it to go back to my PlayStation. If I happen to have a stolen television set, I would never know the difference. (My TV is from Sony, article is about Samsung TVs)
  • cr3ative 5y ago
    In case it's helpful to you, you can ADB over the network to your Android TV and uninstall packages which are annoying to you. I'd wager there's one which this prompt comes from. I have disabled all but the essential apps (for HDMI-CEC function, etc) on my Sony Android TV. Alternatively, set it up once then ban it from the internet.
    • dilippkumar 5y ago
      This hadn't ever crossed my mind! Thanks for the tip. I wonder if I can adb root into my tv via some USB port. Some hardware hacker probably has figured this out - time to go look.
      • Tijdreiziger 5y ago
        Sad state of affairs when you have to hack a device you probably paid well over €1000 for...
  • nyjah 5y ago
    Cr3ative's comment is interesting and I am definitely going to look into that. I fixed my issues with Sony popping up the android crap by allowing the device I am turning on to control HDMI. I'm not the biggest fan of that setting being on, but I turned it off and started getting those android pop ups. It took me awhile to figure out why that was happening as my TV isn't on the internet. I use a Sony television connected to Apple TV with internet fwiw.
• superasn 5y ago
  When it says disabled does that mean it won't even connect to HDMI ports? Because if that's not the case, then all that's needed is an android box which costs like $50 bucks and often performs better than the bloated android rom on tvs.
• debarshri 5y ago
  What are the chances that someone would phish an admin user to the platform that blocks all the TV systems and block the all samsung TV devices. What are the chances that they could be snooping and monitoring what I am watching. It would be nice to see some more transparency in these remote monitoring and management systems. The system setup is very similar to Teamviewer or kaseya where you accept them to manage your device when you accept the terms of service or user agreement. I am not sure if it is just me, but It is making a little paranoid. In my opinion, this is not a good thing.
  • infogulch 5y ago
    > What are the chances that they could be snooping and monitoring what I am watching. 100%. > Samsung Smart TVs have built-in Automated Content Recognition (ACR) technology that can understand viewing behavior and usage including programs, movies, ads, gaming content and OTT apps in real-time. It’s a simple 3-step process: Linked elsewhere itt: https://www.samsung.com/us/business/samsungads/resources/tv-ad-retargeting/ https://www.samsung.com/us/business/samsungads/resources/tv-...
  • long11l 5y ago
    One of the CIA leaks included malware for turning Samsung tvs into a listening device So it's not unrealistic for it to be done my others
  • ipaddr 5y ago
    What leads you to believe they are not monitoring eveything you watch now?
    • debarshri 5y ago
      Jeez. I am going off the grid.
• kunagi7 5y ago
  Unless Samsung enforces an internet connection on the first start of the TV it's completely useless as long as they don't connect it. Still, a worrisome approach. After a few years if they shut down or change the blocking servers will the TV still work or it will become a brick since it can't check its authenticity?
  • 1-6 5y ago
    They do on The Frame series TVs because it's supposed to show 'artwork'. If you don't connect, you'll constantly have to deal with an ugly warning message instead of defaulting to the preloaded images.
• mrkramer 5y ago
  "Should a customer’s TV be incorrectly blocked, the functionality can be reinstated once proof of purchase and a valid TV license is shared to serv.manager@samsung.com or click here for more information" Fuck off. This is a wake up call for us to make free and open source Smart TV operating system so we can stop this tyranny.
  • anonuser123456 5y ago
    Oh the tyranny of having to pay…
    • Ensorceled 5y ago
      I have a 10 year old Sony TV that I have NO proof of purchase for, I threw out that receipt with the box about 3 moves ago.
      • anonuser123456 5y ago
        Well, since you didn't steal it why would they disable it? But if you bought it off the back of some guys truck would you honestly expect it to work?
        • Ensorceled 5y ago
          From the parent: > "Should a customer’s TV be incorrectly blocked, the functionality can be reinstated once proof of purchase and a valid TV license is shared to serv.manager@samsung.com or click here for more information" I don't know why they would block me, but apparently it is something they've created a process for, a process I wouldn't be able to participate in.
          • rad_gruchalski 5y ago
            But they wouldn't. You have a 10 year old Sony TV. This is Samsung.
• ballenf 5y ago
  The ecological impact of this shouldn't be ignored. Imagine the number of iPhones that are activation locked due to oversight of owners before disposal. They are much more likely to become e-waste. Possession as the primary indicator of ownership isn't such a bad option after all. At the very least, there should be a well-known process to remove these locks.
  • bluGill 5y ago
    > The ecological impact of this shouldn't be ignored. Pretty low so long as they only use it for theft. Thieves will soon learn not to steal TVs as there is no value in it. As such it is only a small number of bricked TVs that are landfilled early - nothing compared to all the TVs already landfilled. Now if this is used for something other than theft cases it can get bad, but in this case at least it is a good thing that helps all honest people. > At the very least, there should be a well-known process to remove these locks. There is. Or so they claim, I don't know if it works or not, but supposedly you can just send proof of legal purchase.
    • ant6n 5y ago
      Thieves will still steal TV's, they will just end up in panel repair shops. iPhones still get stolen as well, even though they are worth much less.
      • SilverRed 5y ago
        iOS 15 takes things up a level. Your phone will remain trackable on the find my network even while the phone is turned off and it will remain trackable for weeks after the battery is "flat". Sure there are still methods you could use but it makes theft another level harder. The serial numbers and authentication on each part could also be used to brick each part of the phone if it is marked as stolen making them useless for resale as parts.
    • alerighi 5y ago
      What proof? A receipt from a shop barely lasts the 2 years warranty product if you don't photocopy it, because it's printed on thermal paper. And a lot of people doesn't either keep it. Also is this service going to be maintained forever? The reality is that new TVs and in general new electronics are effectively disposable products, not meant to last in the time. While I have at my house an old CRT with valves in it, that I can repair simply with a soldering iron, as I did a couple of times, and other old electronic devices that still works fine, it's not the same for modern crap. When it breaks the only option is to throw it in a landfill. We should start form the past, where everything came with its schematic in it, and thus the facto open source, where they didn't even imagined something opposed to that, it was natural when you purchase something to be in full control of it, to have the right to know how it worked and how to repair it when it failed. And nobody, I mean no user, complained that there wasn't a way to remotely block their TV in case someone steal it.
• cr3ative 5y ago
  Got it, don't connect the stolen TV to the internet. Just plug in a Fire Stick, Apple TV or what have you. Fortunately, that's good advice in general anyway.
• wait_a_minute 5y ago
  I bought one of Samsung's smart televisions a couple years ago. I think I paid $1500 for it. Anyway, it started showing me ads and the TV eventually became sluggish less than a month after owning it. Returned it as defective. Ever since that experience, I swore of all smart televisions and will never buy another Samsung television or smartphone again if I can help it.
  • VoodooJuJu 5y ago
    Can you recommend a non-smart TV? Seems like everything is smart these days.
  • acchow 5y ago
    Get an LG. Problem solved.
  • lxgr 5y ago
    Have you tried another brand? Seems like you are jumping from "I had a bad experience with one smart TV" right to "smart TVs are to be avoided". I have a smart TV (of another brand) that I am very happy with, and while I don't really use the built-in apps, they are quite decent and – importantly – don't get in the way of me using the TV as a HDMI sink exclusively. It even got native AirPlay support via a software update three years after its original market launch, something I'd absolutely not expect and was quite pleasantly surprised by.
  • lyx0 5y ago
    Same here, I bought a Samsung TV around 5-6 years ago and a year ago it started to show me ads all of a sudden in that 'Media Bar' (I have no idea what's it called, where you select the apps you want to use). A day later I factory reset it and gave it no access to the internet anymore and only stream to it from my PlayStation. This made me swear off Samsung forever. Don't mess with my stuff I bought years ago.
    • rezic 5y ago
      Make sure your HDMI cable doesn't support ethernet... I've seen people comment about their TVs updating through HDMI when connected to peripherals like consoles.
• bellyfullofbac 5y ago
  I guess this will just greatly inconvenience people who bought the TV from the bandits. But well, if this press release is well-distributed among the public, then they will know to avoid buying Samsung TVs from the backs of vans, and the thieves will avoid Samsung warehouses. Alternatively maybe Samsung should just offer the innocent buyers a e.g. 5% discount to "legitimize" their TVs, so if they bought the TV from the back of the van for 50% off, they'll in effect need to pay 145% of the retail price. In effect the thieves would have become a new, strange, retail arm. It's like Uber, but for TV distribution!(TM) More thoughts: the thieves should just cut off the Ethernet port (do they even have these?) and open the TV up and unplug the WiFi antenna. Sure it won't be an Internet TV anymore, but hey, at least their customers/suckers can still watch stuff.
  • aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA 5y ago
    > greatly inconvenience people who bought the TV from the bandits It’s stolen property. The subsequent buyers cannot legally own it.
    • superice 5y ago
      Under Dutch law: sure they can. As long as you had no reason to suspect it was a stolen TV (super low price, no receipt even though it was basically new, stuff like that) a party that bought the TV second hand is now the legal owner even if the initial owner gets ahold of the current owner. Under Dutch law the most common thing this applies to is second hand bicycles. If you bought it off a junkie at the train station for 10 bucks, it's probably not yours to keep. Showing up to a house through a Facebook-group and paying something like 100 bucks for a second hand bike would totally qualify though, even if that bike turned out to be stolen.
      • msh 5y ago
        I think that varies a lot around the world. Under Danish law even if you were in good faith you will still loose the merchandise. If you were in bad faith you can be punished with a fine or even prison in the most severe cases.
• ren_engineer 5y ago
  forget smart TVs, I want somebody to just make a decent dumb TV. Same thing goes for cars, I feel like there is a huge market for "dumb" products. Manufacturers feel the need to keep adding features for some reason
  • simmo9000 5y ago
    HDMI monitor anyone?
  • meowster 5y ago
    From the albeit little feedback I've heard, I hear the Spectre 4K dumb TVs are decent enough. They go up to 75" and Walmart sells them. But yes, I want a bigger market for "dumb" products such as cars, and other consumer appliances such as TVs.
    • meowster 5y ago
      Sceptre* brand
  • speeder 5y ago
    For cars stuff is even harder now. EU for example has regulations that make mandatory for all new cars to come with tracking devices and logging of what you do with the car. EDIT: just remembered the name of one of such things. It is "eCall", now mandatory on EU. It mandates all cars must have GPS, Galileo, microphone, logging, cellphone transmitter, and be able to detect a serious emergency happened and call the police automatically and provide them with all data needed. Seemly removing that crap from the car is illegal too. (I don't live in EU right now so I didn't dove too deep in that subject).
    • KingMachiavelli 5y ago
      > The SIM-card used to transmit the eCall data is dormant, i.e. it is only activated in case the vehicle has a serious accident (e.g. the airbag is activated). At least the EU cares about the privacy implications of some of the stuff it does. If/when this happens in the US, they'll just let the auto companies offset the cost by selling the data it collects. For them it's a win-win-win, the government looks good by improving safety to 90% of people, companies can make more money by selling data, and the government can buy that data to circumvent the legal restrictions on tracking citzens directly. [1] https://ec.europa.eu/transport/themes/its/road/action_plan/ecall_en https://ec.europa.eu/transport/themes/its/road/action_plan/e...
• Santosh83 5y ago
  The larger question for society is do we even want smart everything? I rarely see this issue debated. Undoubtedly, software enables complex/rich functionality for what were hitherto relatively "dumb" devices, but the same flexibility can also lead to exploits, backdoors, bugs and place too much control in the hands of the manufacturers and many other nameless parties. The most important aspect here is remote connectivity. Software without remote connectivity may be less correctable, but it is also resistant towards tampering from unwanted directions. With network connectivity the device basically becomes impossible to fully control. In fact, admin control shifts from you, the owner, to someone else on the other side of the planet, unless you want to take a hammer to it. These issue need vigorous debate. 1. Do we even want every device to become "smart"?, and 2. should smart devices be designed with 24x7 network connectivity requirements?
  • pp19dd 5y ago
    Best I can figure is companies not eating their own dog food. Clever engineers forced in directions the clueless set and enforced. IMO, we lost the TV and car entertainment system battle long ago. It all just went south. And those two are leading symptoms of dumb smartification. Car entertainment systems: lure of reprogrammable "somethings" replaced tactile buttons, distracting drivers. And then the programmable interface became a sequence of terrible things, features and partnerships, completely disconnected from how you use a radio. TV: we went from hundreds of channels modulated on a single coax cable where you can flip instantly and get immediate signal to layers of slow interfaced descrambling and streaming, ... "please wait, updating" ... "please wait, cannot connect to service" ... "service status ok, 4/4" and of course, slow loading interfaces, > 1+ minute time-to-play experiences, audio lipsync issues and balkanization of content streaming, and market juggling of rights. Yes, I'm whining, but why couldn't evolution of at least these two have gone ... better?
    • bencollier49 5y ago
      Good point - I don't understand how it's legal for me to drive my Citroen - the flat panel displays are as distracting as a mobile phone.
  • 5y ago
• Jaepa 5y ago
  How different is this from IMEI blacklisting of stolen phones? The secondary market for stolen phones has kind of disappeared despite cost of phones increasing. EDIT: I think there is plenty of reason to want an open source tv os. They are terrible, ad ridden, bloated commodities. But this seems to be only valid use of DRM I can think of.
  • smoldesu 5y ago
    > How different is this from IMEI blacklisting of stolen phones? It's not. People have been doing this for years now, it looks like the big brouhaha this time is that it's likely disabled when it connects to WiFi, not cellular or GPS info like how a phone might respond.
  • mrkramer 5y ago
    On your phone you might have unencrypted private content and information on the other hand on Smart TV you have entertainment apps and entertainment content no private information at least that is what I think most people have and do. I don't anybody who stores private information on the Smart TV so when stolen Smart TVs start to circulate on the market no private information can be acquired or accessed(besides maybe your login credentials and a credit card) unlike with phones which store vast amount of your private content and information. Idk how IMEI blacklisting works but if they can block at least your private phone number from the network that's good because rogue user can abuse your private phone number and cause havoc because your personal phone number is attached to your identity in numerous databases and records.
    • PeterisP 5y ago
      IMEI blacklisting has nothing to do with private information or user of previous phone number, it does not try to do that, it's a technique that attempts to prevent stolen phones to be used by anyone as the operators would refuse to allow that device (identified by the device's IMEI number) to connect to their network.
      • mrkramer 5y ago
• kenned3 5y ago
  This is why i only buy "Dumb" TV's and connect a third-party "smart" device to them (Firestick, etc) Smart device wants to do some crap like this, in the recycle bin it goes but the TV which cost far more is still good. Many of these manufacturers also have a well documented history of not supporting anything they sold, in an attempt to push new products (buy an android phone and see how many updates it actually gets). Again, far cheaper and easier to replace the smart device instead of the TV when this happens.
  • metiscus 5y ago
    The problem is finding non smart TVs anymore. It used to be that WalMart would have a tv or two that were still just display devices but I haven't seen a non smart tv for sale in quite a while. Honestly, I'm not a big one for regulation, but I think those TVs should have a large print notification somewhere that says they're spying on you - although people would probably accept the convenience tradeoff.
    • uncletammy 5y ago
      > Honestly, I'm not a big one for regulation, but I think those TVs should have a large print notification somewhere that says they're spying on you The warning should replace all the branding on the outside of the package, exactly like tobacco products in Europe.
    • user3939382 5y ago
      It would be cool if we end up with an OpenWRT-type situation for Smart TVs. We establish some rooting procedures for some popular models, and then root it or replace the OS.
• haxorito 5y ago
  That seems like dangerous and very anti-consumer practice. I honestly don’t like smart TVs in general, I haven’t seen one where you won’t end up buying a tv setup box, like Apple TV or Amazon firestick anyway. Samsung you’ve done f up.
• notyourwork 5y ago
  I'm on the fence here, I sort of like the premise that looters don't get their booty. I do agree though I don't like the idea that a corporation can remotely disable a piece of hardware I bought.
  • imglorp 5y ago
    Really? How about this? Your social media $POST critical of $PARTY is incompatible with Samsung's vision of community. We have therefore disabled your $PHONE, $WATCH, $TV, $DISHWASHER, and $PC. Contact serv.manager@samsung.com or click here for more information" Does that possibility change your position?
    • gruez 5y ago
      But if you reached that level of tyranny, shouldn't you be more worried about the state sending Men With Guns to your residence, or blocking you from receiving government services (eg. welfare, healthcare, renewing drivers license)? Not being able to netflix and chill seems like the least of your worries.
      • mdp2021 5y ago
        You may have not considered that appliances allowing profiling are part of the system that may enable the above. Which, also, may not be worse: it may be less absurd under some perspective. Edit: by the way: if you used your handeld and general purpose computers as your extension, which really should be factual, your dismissal would become the least justifiable statement. "Yes, I had an hyppocampus (amygdala etc.) but I probably did not need it that much." Little has more priority than your full ownership of your extensions.
        • gruez 5y ago
          > You may have not considered that appliances allowing profiling are part of the system that may enable the above. Profiling/anti-theft seems orthogonal here. You can have profiling without anti-theft (eg. facebook/google), and you can have anti-theft without profiling (eg. lojack).
• thenayr 5y ago
  I own a (legitimately) purchased Samsung TV (upwards of $3k) from ~2016 or so. It's been a fantastic television up until it suddenly stopped working about a month ago. I figured it would be easy enough to get it serviced and first tried purchasing the suspected bad part (the external HDMI "smart connect" box) directly through Samsung. Discontinued. Ok....I tried the manufacturer service center which routed me to a local repair shop with literally 2 stars on yelp and absolutely terrible reviews. I ended up contacting a 3rd party repair company that specializes in Samsung TV's in San Francisco. I told him the model and he basically laughed and said the part is completely discontinued and he can't purchase it from any of his suppliers and that I was basically SOOL. Spent about two weeks searching online and finally came across a SINGLE listing on EBAY for the model I needed. It seems to possibly be the last of its kind in existence. The TV works again...until this part or another fails. So yeah, that's my Samsung anecdote.
• karteum 5y ago
  No-one forces you to connect your "smart" TV to the network... You can just use it as a "dumb" TV and connect anything on it (such as a Raspberry Pi) to do the "smart" things. I have an old Toshiba smart TV from >7 years ago that I bought second-hand for 100€, and while it is doing great as a dumb TV I would never connect it to the network considering there have been no firmware update for years and that the current one is likely affected by un-fixable security holes !
  • potamic 5y ago
    Just wait till your Samsung TV phones in to your Samsung mobile to share wifi credentials. It's zero click convenience!
  • Tijdreiziger 5y ago
    Are you sure? https://thehometheaterdiy.com/hdmi-with-ethernet/ https://thehometheaterdiy.com/hdmi-with-ethernet/
    • iso1210 5y ago
      As you control your pi, you can control ethernet over hdmi
• xav0989 5y ago
  I vowed to never buy a smart TV, but it's getting harder and harder. Luckily, I recently found that Sony's smart TVs have a mode called "Basic TV". It doesn't require internet and disables a bunch of the extra functions that I don't need my TV to do. I can even disable the bluetooth connectivity to turn the display into as dumb of a TV as possible.
• deergomoo 5y ago
  I’ve wondered about the feasibility of jailbreaking Tizen. Ads aside, my 2019 HDR TV has a bug where HDR10+ content will drop to 1/2 brightness every 6 minutes to the second, until I open the menu. That will reset the 6 minute counter, but it never stops. It’s infuriating. It affects the 2020 models too, but by the looks of a very long forum thread it seems to have been fixed with a software update. They have no interest in fixing the older models, but maybe some enterprising hacker would. I want to say fuck Samsung and that my next TV will be LG, but LG have ads in the menus too. Judging by reviews, most high-end Sony panels cost more money but are missing features I value like VRR. It’s really shitty, there is basically no amount of money you can spend to get both a high-end panel and a user experience that isn’t fucking awful.
  • scns 5y ago
    Search the thread for the Gigabyte oled monitor FO48 IIRC.
• gotostatement 5y ago
  I don't own a smart TV because every smart TV I've used has been in an airbnb and they are generally sluggish to the point of being unusable. Even my plug-in Roku has gotten to this point. I don't understand what it could be. Memory leaks? It's totally bizarre
  • lsaferite 5y ago
    Poor software development is my theory.
  • alerighi 5y ago
    Planned obsolescence. We should really make that practice illegal at some point... but we are too busy imposing people to get rid of they perfectly reliable 20 years old petrol cars to buy crappy new electric cars that will break for a software update and will end up in a landfill...
• chmod775 5y ago
  Overall I'm not against such a thing because at the end of the day this makes theft less attractive and thus protects consumers. However not like this: "Should a customer’s TV be incorrectly blocked, the functionality can be reinstated once proof of purchase and a valid TV license is shared to serv.manager@samsung.com [...]". That's flipping the burden of proof around. Clearly not the way to go about this. Also of course things should work by default and not require you to go online.
  • mminer237 5y ago
    They've all been reported stolen. That already satisfies the burden of proof in Samsung's view. What more proof do you want Samsung to have? They can't prove customers don't have a receipt. It's up to the potential legitimate customer to overcome Samsung's evidence.
    • chmod775 5y ago
      Then having that avenue would not be necessary, would it? It's likely Samsung only has a rough idea which serial numbers were stolen, or there is at least considerable room for mistakes. As a company you don't set up a process for a few outliers.
      • lotsofpulp 5y ago
        What? All the big tech companies on HN get lambasted all the time for excessive automation and not having a process for a few outliers. Why would you NOT want to setup a process for outliers (other than to save money like the big tech companies)?
        • chmod775 5y ago
          If that's supposed to be a rhetorical question, you are missing the point. I'm not saying they shouldn't, I'm saying they wouldn't. If this process was properly implemented they would not help you unlock your TV if you complain. Instead they would be calling the cops because you just gave them a lead on where those TVs went. Which in some universe where typical warehouse management keeps track of serial numbers may actually be what they're planning.
• rad_gruchalski 5y ago
  Many comments here going on about "I do not have a proof of purchase for X". Well, good luck claiming insurances if your property ever gets burgled.
  • chaircher 5y ago
    you only have to prove ownership not purchase for insurance
    • rad_gruchalski 5y ago
      How do you otherwise prove an ownership of an item you have purchased?
      • ketralnis 5y ago
        Lots of ways. My renters insurance just wants a timestamped digital photo
        • rad_gruchalski 5y ago
          Cool. Unfortunately not every country works the same.
• truthwhisperer 5y ago
  awful because next thing what they do is block when you laugh about a funny joke which is female unfriendly or not inclusive. The way to hell is paved with good intentions, as usual
• nate_meurer 5y ago
  I'd love to hear folks' recommendations for non-smart TV's. I haven't paid attention to this topic in a while and I haven't kept up with the technology.
  • cabraca 5y ago
    If i just need a "dumb" TV go for prosumer or commercial solutions. Imaging the TVs you see in big corps or shops. NEC E-Series is good if you're on a budget.
  • karaterobot 5y ago
    I bought the Sceptre 65" (model U658CV-UMC) based on a recommendation in another HN thread last year. There's not a lot to say about it, since all it does is show a signal on a big TV screen, but that's also its biggest benefit. It's an $800 4K 65" TV that doesn't spy on you, so big thumbs up from me. I'm not sure if it's got the best panel in the world or not. It's definitely good enough for me. One thing I accept about myself is that if I am not looking at two TVs side by side, I am not going to know if one is inferior to the other.
    • nate_meurer 5y ago
      Thanks. I'm the same. I'm sensitive to audio quality, but I'm pretty oblivious to the quality of TV screens. I'll happily watch a movie on a laptop as long as I can hook it up to a decent sound system.
  • 1-6 5y ago
    You can always buy a large monitor. For example, AORUS FO48U 48" gaming monitor has 4K OLED, 120Hz, 1ms G2G Freesync Premium for $1400. https://slickdeals.net/f/15210775-aorus-fo48u-gaming-monitor-48-4k-oled-120hz-1ms-gtg-freesync-premium-1399-99?src=SiteSearchV2Algo1 https://slickdeals.net/f/15210775-aorus-fo48u-gaming-monitor...
• onemoresoop 5y ago
  Smart everything enables things to control your behavior, to spy and then to report on you. I haven't ditched my smartphone yet but am using it less often and hold onto a phone till it becomes utterly obsolete (Currently an IPhone SE, still good for me). A smart TV would never be on my buy list. First of all I haven't a TV since they weren't so smart, last TV I had was a CRT in the 2000s. I noticed the difference without one. When I quit TV it was because it was toxic and I presume it has gotten worse since. I do own a projector and fire it up occasionally to watch a movie with the family but it's not on on a daily basis.
• kelvin0 5y ago
  My coffee machine was bricked, once it detected I started drinking Tea. IoT gone wild.
• nottorp 5y ago
  So... I'm supposed to keep the receipt for the lifetime of the TV? Around here I don't even need it for the warranty in some places, they just look the item up by serial no. And what is a "valid TV license" ?
  • denni9th 5y ago
    Some countries require a TV license to own a TV. Its a monthly license fee used to fund public broadcasters.
    • nottorp 5y ago
      And if i'm in a country that doesn't? I'm screwed? Or you think Samsung cares?
• rdiddly 5y ago
  The announcement reads like they're in a frigging war zone. Calm down, you're a TV company.
• jakearmitage 5y ago
  It is impossible to find a "dumb" TV today. It sucks, because I was currently looking for a new 75+ inch one, but everything out there is just smart crap.
  • meowster 5y ago
    They're out of stock now, but they were available last time I checked a few months ago. https://www.walmart.com/ip/Sceptre-75-Class-4K-UHD-LED-TV-HDR-U750CV-U/55427162 https://www.walmart.com/ip/Sceptre-75-Class-4K-UHD-LED-TV-HD...
• tus89 5y ago
  Does anyone connect their TV to the internet these days?
• arduinomancer 5y ago
  This thread feels very...Hacker News Bubble? Why is everyone so confused that smart TVs are popular? Being able to just turn on your TV and open Netflix without messing around with inputs/other devices is a huge benefit for non-technological people. And it probably costs <$50 for the manufacturer to include whatever chip is running linux in the TV, its a no-brainer.
  • hakube 5y ago
    It's running Android for the most part. Samsung is running Tizen I think
  • Allower 5y ago
    >No-brainer As in only a moron would buy one. Yup agreed, the real pandemic destroying humanity is stupidity.
  • elihu 5y ago
    > And it probably costs <$50 for the manufacturer to include whatever chip is running linux in the TV, its a no-brainer. I would assume it costs negative dollars to include that chip in the TV, because the cost is likely more than offset by whatever the app vendors pay to have their app included, and whatever marketers pay for ad placement and telemetry.
  • hoov 5y ago
    There is also spyware running on them. They literally spy on what you're watching and send the info home, and the data gets sold to market to you. No thanks. Edit. They also connect to unprotected wifi networks to send data without your permission.
    • beermonster 5y ago
      And in the case of Toshiba at least, use their own hardcoded DNS which doesn't honour the one handed up by local DHCP or even the one configured in the advanced settings where you can manually configure the DNS! Just stick it in a VLAN to isolate and control.
  • 5y ago
• rock_artist 5y ago
  Looking at some comments, I was surprised seeing many complaints about Samsung ads but (as of writing) no one mentions Google doing same thing lately: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27643208 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27643208
  • mithusingh32 5y ago
    The big difference is with Google you can disable ads for the most part with an ad blocker. Samsung TVs however you cannot. For example I have a pihole server running on my network. I cannot use Disney+ or Hulu on my Samsung TVs. But Nvidia shield and my phone work perfectly. Samsung injects ads into all their apps. Even if you lay for Hulu with no ads, guess what you're still going to get an ad. It won't be a stream stopping ad, but more like ads when you pause a stream.
    • rock_artist 5y ago
      > The big difference is with Google you can disable ads for the most part with an ad blocker. At least from my perspective, any product I buy that impose regression in functionality is a bad practice. It’s the same as if you buy an app and then gets ads in an update.
  • iso1210 5y ago
    Google are an advertising company, it would be like complaining about McDonalds selling fast food. Samsung are an electronics company
    • rock_artist 5y ago
      So should Android start showing ads on your lock screen is that acceptable practice? Or is it acceptable only for Pixel as it’s McDonald’s and evil if it’s a Samsung Galaxy?
      • iso1210 5y ago
        I don't care as I don't use an android as I don't trust google and actively dislike the entire advertising industry and its drain on society. It wouldn't surprise me if google did that. It should surprise me if my oven or fridge did. Sadly it becomes less and less surprising as time goes on.
• vjust 5y ago
  How can they know for sure that some activation was invalid. I'd think this could be challenged in court. If hypothetically the SA govt. declares amnesty for the looting, then will Samsung unlock it. Just saying.
• alerighi 5y ago
  Smart TVs are shit. Especially the modern ones. They got worse rather than better! They are slow and laggy, even doing the most basic things like turning on or changing channel. It was faster the CRT that I used 20 years ago, and it had to warm up before displaying an image! But at least the audio started immediately... They are also not usable. The UI is crappy and you don't find the most common settings, for example I had to search on the internet where to find the option to disable automatic turn off after 4 hours on an LG TV, the remotes are full of useless buttons (I don't want a huge Netflix button on a remote that if I press by mistake I will lose 10 seconds of the program I'm watching!). Now I'm using a Sony TV, that I purchased 2 years ago only because it was the TV with less smart crap in it, it works pretty well, it does what a TV should do, let me watch TV channels, program guide, teletext (yes, I still use it), and nothing else (well in theory it has Netflix and other apps in it... but I never connected it to the internet and they don't get in the way). For all the other things, a simple media center PC does them better.
  • vizzier 5y ago
    Gigabyte's latest OLED monitor looks appealing. LG OLED without the smart features. Recently featured in a LTT video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBE9DL7MlG0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBE9DL7MlG0
    • alerighi 5y ago
      That can be good for a user like me, because I can easily deal with an external set-top-box to watch TV channels (in fact I already have one, that also lets me record TV channels and even stream them on my LAN and outside with a VPN, that is cool since not every channel you find in streaming and also inside the house I don't consume my bandwidth). But there are a ton of users, like my grandparents, that wants a TV that if they press the button 5 on the remote turn on on channel 5, without fancy menu and other stuff. That kind of TV is more and more difficult to find. Next year they change to DVB T2 in my country (but in all Europe the transition is planed to make room for 5G) and thus we must change all the televisions or at least buy a decoder. I'm in difficult finding a TV for my grandmother, that is as simple as the one that has today, and without smart features, that are complicated and also useless (of course she don't even have an internet connection).
• dukeofdoom 5y ago
  Funniest and saddest thing I saw was bookstores being completely ignored during the looting. South Africa's literacy rate declined from 93% to 87% during the last decade.
• juanani 5y ago
  Great, so they just end up in a landfill quicker? Just let the people watch the bs propaganda anyway, they'd be giving screens out for free if we stopped watching them.
• fkfowl3 5y ago
  what does #RebuildSouthAfrica mean? Why is this post tagged with this? Weird
  • powersurge360 5y ago
    South Africa is apparently having large riots and looting going on right now. This video popped up in my YouTube recommendations last week and completely surprised me. I'd tell you more but this video is my only exposure to it so far so I figured I'd just link it than try to say it second hand. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cew-BnjA_q4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cew-BnjA_q4
• TehCorwiz 5y ago
  Smart TVs are an obvious cash grab from TV manufacturers. When a new [Roku|Apply TV|Fire Stick] comes out, a consumer only has to buy that device itself to get access to new features. They don't buy a new tv. In this way "Smart" TVs are a way for TV manufacturers to bond the two devices so that consumers will be locked out of new developments eventually where they'll obviously buy a new TV because they've been conditioned to and because they know the TVs UI and switching is harder.
• trident5000 5y ago
  Looking forward to the future of consumerism. Do something out of line? Your tesla car stops working, samsung tv shuts down, social media bans you, central bank cryptocurrency prevents you from making purchases, airlines put you on the no fly list.
• kbos87 5y ago
  This reminds me of a thread here recently about certain power tools being sold in Home Depot stores that will need to be “activated” or they won’t work as an anti-theft measure. These particular situations aside, I don’t see a problem with this kind of tech, as long as the manufacturer either ends their use or hands the “keys” (whatever they may be) to the buyer after the legitimate sale. The slippery slope argument that “DRM-for-X” tech will be abused by manufacturers who want to charge subscriptions or will brick devices if they close down doesn’t resonate with me, I don’t think we should throw the baby out with the bathwater.
• Tabular-Iceberg 5y ago
  This sounds like it’s going to paint a target for necklacing on the back of anyone who’s found to be a Samsung employee.