Privacy News Stop Your Smart TV from Spying on You: Complete ACR Disabling Guide

[Trident]

I recently installed Paramount App on my TV, well a month or so ago, the amount of trackers on there is enormous, I cant remember the figure at the moment but I was able to block them but...??

These are some third-party signal trackers, there are server side bindings that track what you are watching, which descriptions you are reading, how long you are reading them and so on. There is no escape.

 

[oldschool]

These are some third-party signal trackers, there are server side bindings that track what you are watching, which descriptions you are reading, how long you are reading them and so on. There is no escape.

We're all telemetrized! You will be assimilated. We are The Borg.

 

[cartaphilus]

If you are stuck with ISP Router then you can either configure the DNS directly on the TV via MANUAL IP configuration or double NAT with 2 routers.

Either way not ALL telemetry is bad. Some of it is necessary in order to for the app to report back if there are any config conflicts or update conflicts etc. But yes Majority of it is spying on you to better understand the customer and provide a unique and one of the kind experience. / This message was brought you by Carl Jr. Welcome to Costco I love you

 

[Zero Knowledge]

No need to stream on smart TV, HDMI PC to TV & Watch videos, movies, TV series and TV channels instantly.

 

[oldschool]

The security and privacy intrusions don't stop. Always-on devices like smart TVs are a prime target of AI scrapers.

Free Apps Are Quietly Turning Smart TVs Into Web-Scraping Proxies for AI

Bright Data SDK relays scraping via 150M+ consent-sourced IPs, bypassing VPNs and using up to 200GB/month bandwidth.

thehackernews.com

See below for a deeper look at the technical details.

The Smart TV in Your LivingRoom Is a Node in the AIScraping Economy - Include Security Research Blog

In this post we look under the hood of BrightData's SDK and how it turns ordinary consumer TVs into exit nodes of an enormous commercial, residential proxy network leveraged by the AI industry to scrape web data and train language learning models.

blog.includesecurity.com

@Zero Knowledge

 

[rashmi]

No need to stream on smart TV, HDMI PC to TV & Watch videos, movies, TV series and TV channels instantly.

I'm trying Stremio with Premiumize, and it works well. I'm using the Torrentio add-on for global content and MediaFusion for Indian content.

 

[oldschool]

No need to stream on smart TV, HDMI PC to TV & Watch videos, movies, TV series and TV channels instantly.

If your TV includes apps that abuse the mentioned SDKs you're still SOL because it does its dirty work using your IP address. The TV is a target whether in use or off. One solution is to block those requests via the router. Users with an unconfigurable, ISP-provided combo modem/router need to limit the number of trusted apps.

 

[Zero Knowledge]

If your TV includes apps that abuse the mentioned SDKs you're still SOL because it does its dirty work using your IP address. The TV is a target whether in use or off. One solution is to block those requests via the router. Users with an unconfigurable, ISP-provided combo modem/router need to limit the number of trusted apps.

I think we are beyond arresting users or large fines for piracy. It doesn't matter you use your ISP I.P address because they will go after the service owners.

Is there a risk? Yeah but it's minimal now. Downloading torrents yes you still need a VPN but for pirate streaming they will go after the service owners.

 

[oldschool]

I think we are beyond arresting users or large fines for piracy. It doesn't matter you use your ISP I.P address because they will go after the service owners.

Is there a risk? Yeah but it's minimal now. Downloading torrents yes you still need a VPN but for pirate streaming they will go after the service owners.

I think we're talking about different things. I'm not talking about piracy.

I was referring my post #25. The TV and the IP address can be abused whether you stream to the the TV, use the TV as usual or have it off.

 

[Zero Knowledge]

I think we're talking about different things. I'm not talking about piracy. The TV and the IP address can be abused whether you stream to the the TV, have the TV on or off.

OK please explain. What are you talking about? Malicious apps that turn your TV in to a proxy? How can it abuse your TV if it's off? If it it's off it's network is not connected.

 

[oldschool]

Malicious apps that turn your TV in to a proxy?

Yes. It uses your IP address.

How can it abuse your TV if it's off? If it it's off it's network is not connected.

Explained in the 2 linked pieces.

The findings, published June 5 by Include Security and independent researcher Buchodi, matter because the scraping comes from the user's home IP, not the customer's. The immediate risk is not a hacked account or stolen data; it is that a home connection and its bandwidth get used as someone else's scraping infrastructure.

A connected TV is close to ideal for that: usually plugged in, on a fast connection, effectively unmetered, and unwatched.

The 2nd one breaks it down in detail.

 

[Zero Knowledge]

The 2nd one breaks it down in detail.

LOL won't load due to uBlock and uMatrix.

Again if the TV is off then it can't do anything. While on yes it can be abused by malicious actors/services. But I don't turn on networking so whats the risk?