Is your Samsung TV listening to you?

Forums › Home Theatre (including HTPC and EPG Collector) › Is your Samsung TV listening to you?

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#1733321 8-Mar-2017 21:24

richms:
If samsung were listening they would know that I think the userinterface and picture quality is crap with how much I swear at it.

"Oh come on, how can you make the text _THAT_ blurry"

"Where the F..... is this judder coming from?!"

"Stop turning the F...... backlight down because its a dark scene you piece of S......"

I see your mistake there. Your feedback went to the CIA. You have to say - "Hi TV" - if you want the feedback sent to Samsung corp first.

dafman

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#1733351 8-Mar-2017 21:55

On the positive side, for those who feel dejected because no one ever listens to them ...

Buy a Sammy telly (-;

Batman

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#1733358 8-Mar-2017 22:36

nothing I use is smart other than phone and computers. i think the CIA has to hire 7 billion people to watch the 10 smart devices per person. I wonder if the CIA likes chess and bicycles, i watch a lot of youtube chess and bicycle videos ...

BTR

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#1733494 9-Mar-2017 08:58

scuwp: I am in the camp that I am willing to lose a bit of privacy for the sake of security. If they want to listen to my boring family conversations, go for it.

I agree BUT its when they could use something thats potentially embarrassing to the person being listened to as blackmail. There is always abuse that come with this sort of thing.

It might be the simple fact a young couple have a smart TV with camera in their bedroom and they are having a bit of "fun" and someone in the CIA comes across it and decides to watch or even worse record it and put it on the internet. That becomes a total invasion of privacy and its not due to the user being careless.

I think any form of monitoring without a warrant should not be accepted by society. Why should be let America snoop and listen to what they whole world is doing just for their own good. If they want to snoop on their citizens fine but leave the rest of the world alone.

Fred99

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#1733566 9-Mar-2017 11:09

BTR:

I agree BUT its when they could use something thats potentially embarrassing to the person being listened to as blackmail.

Exactly. Especially if taken out of context, a saint could be made to be seen as at best a despicable hypocrite or dirty rat.

DarthKermit

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#1733573 9-Mar-2017 11:36

BTR:

I think any form of monitoring without a warrant should not be accepted by society. Why should be let America snoop and listen to what they whole world is doing just for their own good. If they want to snoop on their citizens fine but leave the rest of the world alone.

But, but, but, they're the good guys, ain't they?

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tripper1000

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#1733586 9-Mar-2017 11:43

Rikkitic:

scuwp: I am in the camp that I am willing to lose a bit of privacy for the sake of security. If they want to listen to my boring family conversations, go for it.

I think it depends on what the trade-off is. The problem is you have to take their word that it is in your interest and that nothing will be used against you. Personally, I would rather take a chance on security and have my privacy. I don't want to have to watch what I am saying around my TV in my living room. That really is straight out of Orwell.

There are some fundamentally flawed assumptions amongst the suspicious people out there:

1) That this technology will be used to spy on you. I'm sorry but you're just not that important, you don't matter to any government anywhere - end of story.

2) That privacy is more important than life it self. A corpse with privacy is no use to anybody: It certainly doesn't vote or pay taxes.

3) That this technology will be used to blackmail citizens. The CIA/GCSB etc does not/would not release to the public any data gathered via this technology, as it (would have) compromises this technology and cause the loss of the tool when Cisco/Samsung/Symantec etc tightening their security.

This Wiki leak has likely damaged privacy, not protected it. It increases the possibility of this technology being missused because the technology is no longer a closely guarded secrete and it is now available to every criminal out there.

Edit: spelling and grammar.

Fred99

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#1733608 9-Mar-2017 12:21

tripper1000:

There are some fundamentally flawed assumptions amongst the suspicious people out there:

1) That this technology will be used to spy on you. I'm sorry but you're just not that important, you don't matter to any government anywhere - end of story.

<snip>

Oh wow - that's so incredibly wrong on so many levels.

It absolutely will be used to spy on you unless there are laws to protect individual privacy, and those laws are vigorously enforced, there's some transparency in processes which are subject to independent review, and that certainly doesn't happen "everywhere" in the world - nor "anywhere" depending on circumstances.

Rikkitic

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#1733614 9-Mar-2017 12:37

Flawed assumptions are not unique to one side or the other.

The assumption that we are not important enough to spy on is misplaced. Past experience demonstrates over and over that when something becomes technically possible, eventually it gets abused. Someone somewhere somehow will find some way to take advantage of it.

The assumption that it doesn’t matter anyway is naïve. Privacy does matter. It has to do with respect for the individual. A society that diminishes that respect also diminishes protection of the individual. One becomes a replaceable cog, rather than a unique human being. Along that path lies the abandonment of human rights and horrors like Rwanda.

Privacy may not matter to a dead person, but as a fundamental freedom it may well be worth dying for.

There are different kinds of blackmail. Self-censorship out of fear of being overheard is one. Someone in a dark suit knocking on your door is another. These are not paranoid fantasies. It has happened. The price of freedom is eternal vigilance. The time to take action is not after the damage has already been done.

Keeping dangerous knowledge hidden does not benefit privacy when there is an overwhelming imbalance of power. Instead it makes us dependent on the good will and character of those with the knowledge. This is never a good thing. By exposing this information, Wikileaks has made it possible for other knowledgeable people to develop protections and counter-measures. Bringing this into the public arena also ensures that companies like Samsung will be moving fast to plug the holes that have been exposed. Apple and Microsoft are already scrambling to do so. I submit that your assumptions are the flawed ones in this case.

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#1733721 9-Mar-2017 14:26

Rikkitic:

... Samsung will be moving fast to plug the holes that have been exposed. Apple and Microsoft are already scrambling to do so. I submit that your assumptions are the flawed ones in this case.

Any links to Apple and Microsoft doing that?

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#1733728 9-Mar-2017 14:34

Fred99:

tripper1000:

There are some fundamentally flawed assumptions amongst the suspicious people out there:

1) That this technology will be used to spy on you. I'm sorry but you're just not that important, you don't matter to any government anywhere - end of story.

<snip>

Oh wow - that's so incredibly wrong on so many levels.

It absolutely will be used to spy on you unless there are laws to protect individual privacy, and those laws are vigorously enforced, there's some transparency in processes which are subject to independent review, and that certainly doesn't happen "everywhere" in the world - nor "anywhere" depending on circumstances.

Of course it can be used to spy on you, but why use "smart" things when you don't need to? I can drive a car perfectly fine for example, without it connecting to the internet?

I am wondering people using cloud backups ... how do you know the CIA has no access to those things? That is surely more worrying that your fridge? Surely! [no I don't use cloud backup ...]

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Rikkitic

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#1733739 9-Mar-2017 14:44

joker97:

Rikkitic:

... Samsung will be moving fast to plug the holes that have been exposed. Apple and Microsoft are already scrambling to do so. I submit that your assumptions are the flawed ones in this case.

Any links to Apple and Microsoft doing that?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-39203724

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ZollyMonsta

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#1733750 9-Mar-2017 15:14

like me, my Samsung is very old.. Got it in 2008 so not afraid. :)

Check out my LPFM Radio Station at www.thecheese.co.nz - Now on iHeart Radio, TuneIn and Radio Garden

As per the usual std disclaimer.. "All thoughts typed here are my own."

tripper1000

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#1734643 11-Mar-2017 04:16

This problem of spying via hacked firmware existed long before "smart" devices. The CIA had modified firmware for Nokia's back in the day. There was an article on 60 minutes about it and they were loading "dumb" phones with spyware. If required them to get physical access to the phone to load the firmware. Of course, if your device is too dumb to be connected to the web you're pretty safe.

Fred99

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#1734866 11-Mar-2017 16:34

Article from Endgadget on Assange's document dump and what it disclosed.

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