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- Hacker News
- Does this mean that TVs can never be recycled or resold now, adding to the garbage problem? All you have to do is sell the TV to someone who does eventually connect it to the internet and it will upload all the data it acquired while the previous owner had it?by CMay
- I'll just throw this out here: https://www.webosbrew.org/rooting/
I believe I did have to connect it to the network to get it to some web page or other, but after that I had full control of it.
My LG TV is a bit older, though (2021 or so).
by necovek - To me this is where the EU MEPs should place their privacy concerns. Unless it ends up being another consent pop up on TVs.by ksajadi
- I need a Brother for TVs.by dnw
- FYI, Brother has also started enshittifying their printers so don't skip the research the next time you buy.by account42
- by ralferoo
- Is there some way to jailbreak your tv and run som open source os on it? Or something like that?
Not exactly sure what I’m after, but the problem is acute and widely prevalent, so there has to be some solution.
- My understanding is that this is difficult due to DRMd content refusing to work with Free operating systems.
Because yes, this nonsense would never fly in a world where Software Freedom enabled a competitive market for TV operating systems.
by Ajedi32 - Probably just never give it internet access and plug in an HTPC with some form of Linux (I've heard KDE's Plasma Bigscreen is better than ever, though I haven't tried it myself)by yonatan8070
- by abeyer
- You can root most LG TVs but I'm not sure an alternative firmware exists or if it's even feasible.by cassianoleal
- All smart TVs should be disconnected from the internet. Use an AppleTV or similar.by sroussey
- All smart TVs should not come with WiFi or Ethernet controllers.by ihsw
- Part of the issue is many TV's these days are essentially bricked until you connect them to the internet to "activate".by _fat_santa
- “or similar” like what?
Streaming sticks suffer from the exact same problem.
The Apple TV is the only device I know of in this space whose business model is not selling your data to the highest bidder.
by drdexebtjl - Just disable wifi. Occasionally factory reset, hook up to wifi for firmware update, then disable again.by indymike
- >All smart TVs should be disconnected from the internet.
Not good enough. The device has sufficient storage for YEARS of conversation data.
You connect it once to update the firmware and boom everything is backfilled. Your neighbor sets up an open SSID? It all gets out.
- I have connected it to my network and then blocked it off the internet via Pi-hole. That way, I hope, it'll not try to scan for other open networks.by krtkush
- Not sufficient, given reports of TVs and other devices automatically creating mesh networks. Your disconnected TV could talk to your neighbour's connected one. If anything, I wonder why LG isn't already doing it.
Edit: Getting pushback asking for evidence (fair). Most recently I read it in an HN thread a few years back. I thought it was a TCL TV, but I can't find it anymore. It wasn't Samsung's WiFi Direct, which I don't think was ever on by default.
Lacking better evidence, I'll admit I'm probably wrong and no TV has been documented doing this (yet).
by Cpoll - Some TVs will present a popover warning that they have not been able to check for updates for a while, after being disconnected for some time, and you can't close that without letting them connect (even if you are just using the screen to display content from an HDMI slot rather than using any of the other TV features).by dspillett
- > In July this year, the channel flagged that some LG monitors were automatically installing an app that collected device data and ran pop-up ads for LG’s other apps and even McAfee antivirus. The public pressure from that video prompted an intervention from Microsoft, and ultimately led to LG disabling the pop-up ads.
Can anyone explain why Windows even makes this possible? I had to fight against Windows installing Alienware command center nonsense automatically because I have a "gaming" Dell OLED. Windows automatically fetched and installed it just from plugging in the monitor, adding a new system tray icon and persistent daemon with these kinds of annoying pop-ups and probably a bunch of security vulnerabilities.
It's completely incomprehensible to me. The monitor works great without it, on both Windows and Linux! I left a negative review on an otherwise good monitor as a result, but Microsoft shouldn't even be entertaining this crap.
by dathery - I hope I can soon get fable or the like to execute
"Please scan my computer for spyware, and if found, either remove it or find an exploit to permanently cripple the spying part of it"
by WarmWash - I largely don't use Windows anymore, but there is an option buried under Advanced System Settings/Properties under the hardware tab called Device Installation Settings. There you can turn this off (marked 'not recommended').
I know about this because I have a Windows 10 VM that was automatically installing an old broken Radeon driver through it that would just leave me with a black screen on boot. I also learned that if Microsoft got the scent of the driver and started downloading it turning this option off didn't stop that particular driver from continuing to download and hosing the install. Since I lacked a snapshot before this I had to reinstall the the entire OS in the VM with the GPU not passed through and then turn the option off first.
- this feature probably began life as "automatically download necessary drivers to make installation easier" and then after some massaging the definition of "necessary drivers" expanded to "anything the manufacturer would like to see running on this PC regardless of how necessary it is for the device to function".
- The intention is to allow for automatic installation of software that is actually needed for the function of the peripheral - think proprietary cameras or non-standard printers/IO/etc. It's not a bad goal, but it leads to manufacturers abusing it, unsurprisingly, for things that are not, in fact, necessary.by kyralis
- > Can anyone explain why Windows even makes this possible?
Because, as much as we nerds might hate it, it's convenient to a large number of people. They plug in their device and the companion software to fully use all its features just installs itself. They don't have to go to some obscure URL and then locate their exact product. Even in the case you've described, the software likely enables some features of your monitor that aren't accessible otherwise. You don't care about them, but someone might.
by tredre3 - Is there anyone who has done a technical write up and investigation into the firmwares?
Like reverse engineering how the software on the TVs work.
Also what third parties are involved.
I have a feeling there must be some third party vendor selling the same toolkit that manufacturers use.
Would be nice to figure out if it's possible to send junk data to the endpoints.
by Jonnax - > Is there anyone who has done a technical write up and investigation into the firmwares?
I extracted the firmware and filesystem of a webOS 3.5 and webOS 24 TV previously so I could remove the spying bits and get an internet connected TV back. I asked Claude Opus 5 to do some analysis on the ACR implementation yesterday. I haven't had time to check it myself, so it might give some insight but take it with a grain of salt. Also because I'm not entirely sure I extracted the complete filesystem for the webOS 24 TV.
See the documents temporarily hosted here [1][2][3]. You can find the Markdown originals in the HTML source. The Markdown has also been pasted here [4] (although the forum software has sometimes inserted a lot of tildes).
LG uses the "Alphonso SDK" for ACR, a company which it seems to have a majority stake in [5].
WebOS itself is actually pretty neat once you get root on the device. It still has open source releases, uses a well documented service bus, the UI apps are unobfuscated Javascript. It's a genuine Linux TV if only LG allowed you to get root and would not install spyware by default. Secure boot unfortunately does prevent you from messing with the boot process.
If you want to know anything specific, let me know. There's also a pretty active Discord (ugh) community here [6].
Personally, I'm most interested whether LG and other device manufacturers are getting informed consent for ACR in European markets, and what the consent screen looks like. I doubt that many consumers actually know what they're consenting to, which might be a GDPR violation.
[1] https://scriptbase.org/lg-tv/webos-24.html
[2] https://scriptbase.org/lg-tv/webos-3.5.html
[3] https://scriptbase.org/lg-tv/comparison.html
[4] https://gathering.tweakers.net/forum/list_message/86090672#8...
[5] https://www.adexchanger.com/tv-2/lg-grabs-a-majority-stake-i...
by Confiks - Me too. I was hoping for a better write up than a pay walled verge article. Yes I'm being lazy but this is hn and I like technical break downs and not just moral panic. I own an older lg tv and I'm not dismissing the societal issues.by bahmboo
- Gamers Nexus has a 2h video doing reverse engineering and a lot of testsby d0100