Salon – by Michael PriceI just bought a new TV. The old one had a good run, but after the volume got stuck on 63, I decided it was time to replace it. I am now the owner of a new “smart” TV, which promises to deliver streaming multimedia content, games, apps, social media and Internet browsing. Oh, and TV too.
The only problem is that I’m now afraid to use it. You would be too — if you read through the 46-page privacy policy.
The amount of data this thing collects is staggering. It logs where, when, how and for how long you use the TV. It sets tracking cookies and beacons designed to detect “when you have viewed particular content or a particular email message.” It records “the apps you use, the websites you visit, and how you interact with content.” It ignores “do-not-track” requests as a considered matter of policy.
It also has a built-in camera — with facial recognition. The purpose is to provide “gesture control” for the TV and enable you to log in to a personalized account using your face. On the upside, the images are saved on the TV instead of uploaded to a corporate server. On the downside, the Internet connection makes the whole TV vulnerable to hackers who have demonstrated the ability to take complete control of the machine.
More troubling is the microphone. The TV boasts a “voice recognition” feature that allows viewers to control the screen with voice commands. But the service comes with a rather ominous warning: “Please be aware that if your spoken words include personal or other sensitive information, that information will be among the data captured and transmitted to a third party.” Got that? Don’t say personal or sensitive stuff in front of the TV.
You may not be watching, but the telescreen is listening.
I do not doubt that this data is important to providing customized content and convenience, but it is also incredibly personal, constitutionally protected information that should not be for sale to advertisers and should require a warrant for law enforcement to access.
Unfortunately, current law affords little privacy protection to so-called “third party records,” including email, telephone records, and data stored in “the cloud.” Much of the data captured and transmitted by my new TV would likely fall into this category. Although one federal court of appeals has found this rule unconstitutional with respect to email, the principle remains a bedrock of modern electronic surveillance.
Michael Price is counsel in the Liberty and National Security Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law.
“Behind Winston’s back the voice from the telescreen was still babbling away about pig iron and the overfulfillment of the Ninth Three Year Plan. The telescreen received and transmitted simultaneously. Any sound that Winston made, above the level of a very low whisper, would be picked up by it; moreover, so long as he remained within the field of vision which the metal plaque commanded, he could be seen as well as heard. There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time. But at any rate they could plug in your wire whenever they wanted to. You had to live – did live, from habit that became instinct-in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized.”
This is one of a number of reasons I don’t watch the idiot box anymore.
My father, a TV repairman who was in the Air Force for 8 years, hated TVs. Lately, I’ve been thinking he knew far more than what he let on.
Familiarity breeds contempt?
well i happen to be an engineer myself,
and i’ll tell you now, i wouldnt use a Samsung smart-tv without both removing the camera/mic and replacing the software in it.
samsung tv’s call home, i dont know what data they send, but south korea is everything they tell you the north is.
paranoia and state data collecting is extreme to put it lightly.
Right after the super bowl I’m pulling the plug on Dish Network. My car is 32 years old, my fridge is 20, and I’ll never ever buy a new tv again.
“We should not have to channel surf worried that the TV is recording our behavior for the benefit of advertisers and police.”
Perhaps this may explain why the prices for Smart multimedia, like giant flat screens, have dropped drastically?
This microphone/camera feature was turned on and used (test run) during the “Boston B” episode.