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I didn't realize my LG TV was spying on me until I turned off this setting
(www.pocket-lint.com)
this post was submitted on 26 Dec 2025
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Privacy
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Plenty of TVs are capable of radioing your neighbour's TV and piggybacking off their internet connection, so if it's not in a Faraday cage, it might be overconfident to say it's never been connected to a network.
Source? Never heard of that ever.
Source on this?
I don’t know if they use it on their Fire TVs but Amazon Sidewalk, for instance, does exactly what the previous commenter described.
Not OP, but I have heard that some smart TVs do automatically join open networks. Whether it's true or not, I can't say.
But if it is true, I would imagine it would vary between manufacturers and even specific device models.
Have no open networks around.
I guess I never considered going door-to-door in the apartment complex and smashing everyone's Wi-Fi router whose settings displease me.
10/10 suggestion, will attempt.
The obvious choice is "don't buy tvs that might do this" but if you've already got one, open up the case, find the wifi antenna, and pull the little connection out.
Im gonna guess most people who buy tvs like this dont have the knowledge to do this.
This is not a reasonable answer lol
Many times there aren't reasonable solutions to unreasonable situations. You pick from the options you have.
That's fair.
This sounds just like when my family member tell me that their phones are “listening to what they say” because they talk about something and then see an advertisement for it.
No, you’re seeing the ad because you googled it and forgot that you did. Or someone else on the house did.
...you're so far behind the times, it's comical. Yes, there are microphones around you transmitting the shit you say (or at least sentiment markers from it). Absolutely insane that there are people who don't believe this today.
A couple of years back, my sister and I were talking of buying some seeds for my mom, who's an avid gardener. Neither of us had looked anything up. Next things we browsed on our phones, unrelated to the subject, we were served a bunch of gardening ads.
Pretty damning evidence, if you ask me.
Automatically joining open networks is a feature built into many devices, this is simply alleging that some TVs come with it enabled by default..
Also, that is a real feature that some advertising company's offer to their clients:
https://www.404media.co/heres-the-pitch-deck-for-active-listening-ad-targeting/
Sounds like you owe some of your family members an apology.
I have never had a device join an open network by itself.
And of the several hundred, or thousands, of smart TV models available, how many have you owned?
Of the tens of thousands of IoT devices available, how many have you owned?
Just trying to figure out the sample size that you based your statement on.
You're going to need to provide some evidence for such a claim. That doesn't even sound legal.
Not OP but I think this guy is remembering a scene from silicon valley, not from reality. That said it's probably not that far off. Amazon smart devices absolutely have this "feature" in production today-- and it's opt-out, not opt-in.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Sidewalk
Thanks for that. Just another reason to be glad I've banned any Amazon devices in my house. It's already insane enough to me that people literally have to think before they speak in their own homes to avoid accidentally triggering the always-listening robo-creepy-spy in the next room.
Interesting. But my house basically is a faraday cage. I have no signal outside it from my wifi or any of the others because of the way they were constructed. I have to have wifi repeaters indoors and a mobile repeater setup to get cell coverage inside.
So I guess I'm lucky in that respect.
But all in all this is good information for people to know including me. Thanks for that.