• ragebutt@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 month ago

    FYI most modern TVs have a second microphone actually in the display that’s actually used for the nefarious tracking and listening for assistant wake words to save remote battery life

  • Blizzard@lemmy.zip
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 month ago

    It has no way of sending any recordings if you don’t connect it to the Internet.

    • yeehaw@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 month ago

      What about LTE. I didn’t connect my new car to the internet. They did. 🙃

    • Mark with a Z@suppo.fi
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 month ago

      But what if

      • your neighbor has open wifi?
      • someone nearby has a connected device your tv can talk to?
      • you sell the tv and it then gets connected?
      • Pipea@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 month ago

        then my neighbor is gonna have an interesting conversation with the cops about how much illegal drugs he’s been ordering over the internet. Geez man, that’s not even a reasonable argument, nobody has an open wifi, it’s not 2001 anymore.

    • white_nrdy@programming.dev
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 month ago

      I have heard that some vendors support joining adhoc networks with others of the same brand. So if you have an LG TV (as an example) that you dont connect to the internet, but your neighbor has one that is connected, they could theoretically link up and bridge the unconnected one.

      To be fair, this would have to be functionality included in the factory, and may not actually be a thing. But I remember reading something about it with LGs a few years ago, and it stuck with me.

      • ericwdhs@discuss.online
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 month ago

        Even if that wasn’t a thing yet, WiFi chips can be bought for less than $1 each in bulk now, and companies can put a monetary value on one person’s private data in the range of $1000 and up, so schemes like that are inevitabilities.

        I used to look forward to global Internet coverage. While I still think it’s overall a good thing, I fear the day it’s ubiquitous and reliable enough that electronics are widely built to connect to it automatically without fallbacks or user input and make it nigh impossible to disable while keeping the device functional. We seem to be getting there sooner rather than later. I definitely feel less guilty about hoarding older hardware now.

  • UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 month ago

    Things will become more obscure and harder to disable. In fact since you own nothing and you’ll be happy, youre damaging government property and the police are already dispatched to take you to a totally cool and totally legal prison slave camp.

      • Goforce5@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 month ago

        I thought that greentext was so outrageous when it first appeared, and now its probably going to be reality at some point.

        • cuerdo@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 month ago

          Youtube asking you to say the brand name or the jingle to skip the add. You heard it here first

          • JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            0
            ·
            1 month ago

            They’ll gamify it. Remember “Karaoke Revolution”? I think “Rock Band” and its derivatives also built upon it.

    • Duamerthrax@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 month ago

      Remotes aren’t complicated enough to hide the microphone. It’s more likely that tvs ditch the remote entirely and be voice controlled only, mute people be damned.

  • ArmchairAce1944@discuss.online
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 month ago

    The last TV I had was a 37 inch I sold in 2020. I stopped watching TV in 2003. I have been terminally online since late 2000 and 2001.

    • boonhet@sopuli.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 month ago

      I’ve been terminally online for almost as long, but tbh the TV is good for background noise, or to watch something while you work, shitpost or play on your PC, situated so you can see the TV

        • yxc999@lemmy.mlOP
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 month ago

          Out of fucking principle, yes it’s not connected, but I won’t tolerate a mic in my remote. Besides, you have heard of them being able to use your neighbour’s unsafe WIFI if you have to act so smart, right?

          • Auli@lemmy.ca
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            0
            ·
            1 month ago

            What year is this that there is Open WiFi all over the place. Everything is encrypted now by default.

            • despoticruin@anarchist.nexus
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              0
              ·
              1 month ago

              Xfinity broadcasts open wifi networks by default through their gateways and can be connected with authentication through Xfinity. It is entirely feasible to have a deal that allows them to connect through that network.

    • JustEnoughDucks@feddit.nl
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 month ago

      To the WiFi?

      You are often forced to in order to set it up at all, the damage is already done if you disconnect it or VLAN quarantine it after that.

      It doesn’t stop the TV from spying on you. GN just proved that it runs STT and records your conversations in plaintext and has the memory to store them for eternity. It also gets your location from scanning WiFi, Bluetooth, and any other devices in the band and geolocating based off of their data.

      Then if you ever sell the TV, it will dump the data if they connect it, or somebody with the same brand smart TV moved in next door, it will use that TV’s hidden SSID hotspot to jump the airgap and dump all if its (likely time and position stamped) transcribed spying data to the servers.

      Hardware fix is literally the only fix.

      • webghost0101@sopuli.xyz
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 month ago

        Can you help me understand why i got downvotes for posting the following comment in this very same community 2 days ago?

        I am not saying the following happens, i think there is no proof it happens, but its technically doable.

        They are capable of scanning for local networks and bluetooth devices which can be used to identify a location. (This part they definitely do)

        If your neighbour has an lg tv, or the presence of the tv is extracted through your phone. Then they know where it is and they also know of any open/public wifi networks around.

        The researchers from gamers nexus can connect to 2 (ssid) networks at once for some reason.

        In theory a neighbours lg tv could broadcast their wifi credentials to your tv to connect to upload the data.

          • hirihit640@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            0
            ·
            1 month ago

            I personally haven’t seen any proof that they are actively doing this, but I’ve seen enough about Amazon Sidewalk and from the Gamer’s Nexus video to be certain that they are capable of these methods, and if they aren’t doing it now they’ll probably do it soon.

            In most cases by the time the evidence breaks, it’s years after the fact, and so better to be on the precautionary side.

          • livligkinkajou@slrpnk.net
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            0
            ·
            1 month ago

            I haven’t watched it all yet, but most of it is demonstrated on the latest Gamer Nexus video “216,000,000 Spy TVs | The LG Smart TV Problem”. In case you haven’t seen it yet:

            Non YT link

            Interesting timestamps:
            00:16:33 - Intercepting LG’s Data Transfer
            00:22:04 - Dark Patterns
            00:46:19 - Plain Text Transcript and Ambient Conversation

        • genzboomer@lemmy.zip
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 month ago

          It connects to Le Open Wifi from your neighbours, or adhoc to a TV of the same make, or saves up all the logs and transfers them when the next owner of the TV connects it to their own network.

          To be clear: I have no proof of this, but since it is all closed source, we probably will never know.

      • TrollAccount69@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 month ago

        “Nx” is usually a resistor “n”etwork. The mic is probably something else, it could be the M designators or even a “t”ransducer.

        Anyway you may find that the remote uses a bunch of mics. Once you’re no longer trying to catch sound in a way that will be discernible to human ears it can become an order of magnitude cheaper to send several fraction of a cent mics into the 69 dsp channels every fucking soc has nowadays. You’re getting the silicon for free, might as well use it.

  • ᴋɪᴋɪ@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 month ago

    What? Because I have to demonstrate my control, I understand almost nothing about technology. Don’t tell me it has a chip that controls everything, I make my own TV remote.

  • codenul@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 month ago

    Or just buy a cheap 3rd party off brand universal remote. Dont have to use the one that comes with the TV

  • sumsinj@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 month ago

    Do people here still have their smartphones or are these things the first on the microphone hitlist?

      • sumsinj@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 month ago

        Yea, im stuck with not flashable phones sadly amd everytime i read something on here I get kinda sick

        • steelplatedmech@piefed.ca
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 month ago

          Yeah, GrapheneOS is worth switching to by getting a compatible phone if you can afford it with how it is probably our most used and carried around electronic used for communication.

        • yxc999@lemmy.mlOP
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 month ago

          The Pixel 9a is getting cheap and looking for them on the used market is even better, do yourself the favor and get one!

    • myyass@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 month ago

      my shitphone, I mean iphone is really pissed that the case (water resistant) I have blocks mic, and well the audio as well lol. And the aluminum tape on the cameras makes it glitch up so much.

  • davetortoise@reddthat.com
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 month ago

    I’m tempted to try this but I’m not sure how to identify the microphone or whether it would be in my remote or the TV itself. Is there some sort of guide on doing this?

    • yxc999@lemmy.mlOP
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 month ago

      While it’s not always the case, try to look for a 2x4 silver rectangle with a hole in it like the one on my finger. The casing is to isolate it from the nearby radio waves and the hole to let sound through.