LG strongly denies TV spying claims, says tracking and snooping concerns 'not true' — online investigation claims 216,000,000 TVs spy and record audio

https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/big-tech/lg-strongly-denies-tv-security-claims-says-tracking-and-snooping-concerns-not-true-online-investigation-claims-216-000-000-spy-tvs-record-audio

342 points · 44 comments · view on lemmy.world

44 Comments

Deebster@infosec.pub · 137 pts · 18h (2 replies)

The Gamers Nexus video is pretty convincing, and demonstrates the logs and activities they're reporting. The LG response basically admits to half the things GN claimed, yet somehow LG says they're lies. I guess it'll work on people that only read headlines.

Obituarykidney@lemmy.world · 53 pts · 16h

I'm a big headline only kinda guy when I'm just scrolling, but any time I see "corporation says" I know it's the opposite.

Arda@piefed.social · 13 pts · 17h

I don't know how much more they could've proved it

JustEnoughDucks@slrpnk.net · 95 pts · 18h

They literally advertise the opposite to their advertising network, saying "we know everything that goes on in an LG living room"...

IanTwenty@piefed.social · 42 pts · 18h (1 reply)

Then prove it LG and remove the dark patterns from your consent opt-out

elvith@feddit.org · 26 pts · 17h

First step: just make it opt-in

dbtng@sh.itjust.works · 37 pts · 9h (2 replies)

This article whitewashed the whole thing and accepted LG's angle, right up to reprinting their bullshit in full.
Such crap is entirely insufficient for a tech publication, "Tom's Hardware has not independently verified either the claims made by Gamers Nexus in its documentary or LG's counterclaims."

Why? Why did you publish and throw up your hands saying "we know nothing"?
Was there possibly some money involved? Don't want to piss off your advertisers?
I reviewed this Stephen Warwick's articles. He's a corpo shill.
Miserable excuse for journalism.

refalo@programming.dev · 11 pts · 8h

Unfortunately tomshardware is not what it was 20+ years ago.

ikidd@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 10 pts · 7h

I mean, when you have LG ads plastered all over your site, who are you going to side with?

spacegoat@lemmy.world · 34 pts · 15h (1 reply)

Corporate death penalty, now

Doomsider@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 8h

Person kills another human being = Life in prison or possible execution.

Company kills a bunch of people = Maybe a fine.

cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 31 pts · 14h (18 replies)

It's crazy because if they allowed savvy users to cleanly opt out of everything, they'd still make a killing. Smart users who block ads and resist advertising and incentives have never really been a problem for companies. They aren't being targeted for the most part, they just don't want most people getting out of their web.

I also don't fully blame the companies. Consumers not only allowed this, they actively campaigned for it. For every company that has tried to push privacy, the Internet/populace has pushed back. Those of us who care are having to lie in the bed made by the rest because those companies that promoted privacy are starting to learn they have to adapt or survive. 15 years ago we literally had a phone made by a computer company and a phone made by an advertising company, and the right one didn't win... so now it's just following the trends the consumers demanded.

dbtng@sh.itjust.works · 10 pts · 8h (3 replies)

Wait ... are you lamenting the demise of the Micro$oft phone?
Seriously? In public and all? What the hell is wrong with you?
For the record, I DO blame the companies.

cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 5h

Eh. Which one? I once had a $10 Nokia phone that ran Windows... 8? The mobile version, I mean. I got it for shits and giggles. It was cheap and I thought, no way could this thing be good. It actually surprised me. I ended up gifting it to a friend who needed a phone. I think he got like 2 years out of that thing.

Windows Phone before the iPhone was trash though. The old smartphones. Most of them were hot garbage. The iPhone cleaned house for a reason. Later Windows phones weren't bad, they just didn't sell.

Bakkoda@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 7h (1 reply)

Very specifically says not fully blame. That means shared blame. Consumers keep eating shit with a spoon.

dbtng@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 7h

And that's why I have to neuter any device I buy.
Fuken pain in the ass, but that's our world.

annoying_cyclist@programming.dev · 4 pts · 9h (2 replies)

App Tracking Transparency on iOS devices is an interesting test case for this argument. When an app wants to track you, you're asked in plain language whether you want to be tracked. You can say no. You don't have to be a savvy user to say no, and the consent is explicit rather than being buried in a EULA that you don't read. If you say no, the app will likely still work fine. Specific numbers vary, but somewhere between a majority and a vast majority of iOS users opt out when given that choice. How much that costs advertisers is harder to reason about (a lot of the data comes from advertisers themselves, who are hardly unbiased), but the data are at least consistent in arguing that ATT opt outs produce a quantifiable drop in ad engagement (clicks, etc) and ad spend.

I'm personally a big fan of ATT. You shouldn't have to be a savvy user to opt out of surveillance capitalism. I also don't personally care that much about how effective online advertising networks are. But I think LG and similar companies are probably not off base to worry about making it possible to cleanly opt out of everything. From their perspective, that wouldn't be a great outcome.

dbtng@sh.itjust.works · 6 pts · 7h

Its more than an opt in or out problem with LG.
You remember, oh a fukin month ago? LG installs spywear with no prompt when you plug in one of their monitors on a pc. This TV shit is more of the same and certainly more egregious than other brands.

cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 5h

I loved when Facebook took out a full page ad saying ATT was hurting small businesses. I love how Tim Cook introduced it. I'm paraphrasing, but he said something like "starting with iOS version whatever, Facebook will still be able to track you across the web via your iPhone. They just need your permission first." And he shows the prompt and shows that you can hit yes or no, or allow or decline, whatever it is. I actually have the setting that doesn't allow them to ask. They are allowed to make a case to you, but they can't track until you say yes or hit allow. And that's how it should be.

The thing is, people are looking real hard at what Apple is doing, and Apple is saying they're a privacy company. Their words are "Privacy. That's iPhone." But people are reporting that that isn't always the case. And now they have ads in Maps. They've had them in the App Store. They suppress apps that are free and only promote apps with recurring subscriptions. And I suppose that's their right, but the App Store itself is just so toxic these days. They're adding more ads. Those who say Google isn't an advertising company are straight up wrong, but they just remember when Google was a search company or an email company. Now they are an ad company. I'm wrong to say Apple is a computer company. They're a phone company now. It's close enough that I'm not being disingenuous. One day they may be an advertising company, too. But that's what people want. People buy phones from the advertising company over the phone/computer company for whatever reason. I'm not saying Apple is struggling. They're not. But they're following the money.

Doomsider@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 8h (10 replies)

You don't fully blame the companies? Do you also not fully blame rapists because those women dress so provocatively. I suppose they demanded the rape because they picked the wrong "sexy" dress years ago. So now the rapes are just following the trends they demanded!

Bakkoda@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 7h (1 reply)

Holy shit this is deluded.

Doomsider@lemmy.world · -3 pts · 7h

Another blame the victim monster.

cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 3 pts · 5h (1 reply)

Really?

Do better.

Doomsider@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 5h

That is exactly what I was telling you. Get a clue.

ikidd@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 7h (5 replies)

You forgot to call them a pedophile and literally Hitler. Falling down on the ranting lunatic job there.

Doomsider@lemmy.world · -3 pts · 7h (4 replies)

Did that analogy make you feel uncomfortable!? Oh gosh, why don't you go lick some more corporate boots I guess.

ikidd@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 0 pts · 6h (3 replies)

IDK if you think that edit made it any less "sir, this is a Wendys" than before.

Doomsider@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 5h (2 replies)

What does it taste like?

ikidd@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 5h (1 reply)

Probably less bitter than your meds.

Doomsider@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 5h

I am sorry to hear you experience mental health issues in your life and are projecting. Are you okay?

JakenVeina@midwest.social · 27 pts · 8h

If they had any leg to stand on, they'd be suing, not putting up a PR front.

steelplatedmech@piefed.ca · 16 pts · 14h

Penalties and fines that have happened for breaking privacy laws has been too low for it to deter any companies making money off this that I don't believe them.

strop@lemmy.ml · 16 pts · 17h

KDE Plasma Bigscreen

oyzmo@piefed.social · 12 pts · 17h

Of course they deny! 😂 - We are spying on you, and btw installing adware without you noticing on our monitors, without telling you... we know that could cause you to not trust us, but really, you have to trust us now. Your concerns aren't true! (we don't like to phrase it to straight forward, that could cause legal troubles for the thing we don't do) 😆

brem@lemmy.world · 10 pts · 17h

I bet they can legally claim "the concerns" "aren't true".

Our concerns "don't matter" to them.

Privacy & safety are now a gated privilege for the social elite & most wealthy.

We all know every device with any way to contact these companies are sending increasingly more information about us, and that info is sold to the highest bidder.

HugeNerd@lemmy.ca · 3 pts · 5h (2 replies)

I miss when TV was a vacuum tube and entertainment didn't take up our entire lives.

4grams@awful.systems · 4 pts · 4h (1 reply)

I don’t miss the tube days. I still remember the day Sony’s new 36” flat screen tv’s came in and I had to unload a semi trailer full of them alone. Each one weighed 276 pounds.

GreenKnight23@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3h

dept manager wanted those to go on the top rack in the warehouse because they weren't sold as often.

we told them that someone will get hurt when they have to pull one alone, which was common. they said they didn't care and to "figure it out".

three weeks and five broken TVs later the store manager asked why these items were so high on shrink reports. we explained to him what had happened. within the hour they were all moved to the bottom and the 13 inch TVs were moved to the top. he even helped us move them.

for those three weeks whenever I would inevitably need to grab one, alone, I would just climb up and push it off the top rack. where it would fall the 20ish feet to the concrete floor and explode inside the box. I'd explain to the customer that I just broke the last one we had(lie) and to go buy it from our competition.

the dept manager was written up for creating a hazardous working environment and eventually quit after some other idiotic choices.

IceFoxX@lemmy.world · -24 pts · 17h (5 replies)

That's what you get worked up about.... But things like uXDT and so on don't bother you? Ridiculous.

IceFoxX@lemmy.world · -15 pts · 13h (4 replies)

Wow, already 8 downvotes... So you guys actually love all the other tracking methods and are specifically bothered by just this one. Rofl

AHemlocksLie@lemmy.zip · 8 pts · 10h (3 replies)

Do you think humans are only capable of disliking one thing at a time?

IceFoxX@lemmy.world · -8 pts · 10h (2 replies)

Nah, but most people here don’t even think about all the tracking methods from before the days of smart TVs and so on anymore. But since people are also getting upset about cameras, they might want to look up some research papers on displays—or, to be more precise, LEDs—and how an image can be created at close range using back-reflected light and voltage differences. And then there are so many other tracking methods that people have long since forgotten or never even knew about.

I’d rather be upset that my own country is tracking me just as much and has its own shadow databases and so on. With all the EU’s plans—like EUDI, Omnibus, and so on—I find that far worse (I don’t mean to downplay it… but LG can’t just throw me in jail for having the wrong opinion or something like that…).

Oh, and with incidents like this one... I still hold out hope that Western politicians might reconsider their stance on the fight against encryption, VPNs, and so on.

Axolotl_cpp@feddit.it · 2 pts · 7h (1 reply)

With your mentality we shouldn't complain or worry about anything since there is always something else to worry about, further more i'd like to add that (at least here on the fediverse) we complain always about all the kinds of privacy intrusions, i saw posts about all the kinds so your point is even more senseless

IceFoxX@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 5h

Is that the conclusion you're drawing? Completely wrong. In my opinion, you can't trust technology at all unless it's open hardware! In other words, you should generally treat these devices as if they were spying on you—not just when something like this comes to light. But now I'd like to know which of you are constantly listening for ultrasound sounds (uXDT) in your own homes, for example, and so on.