This ties into a major problem I have with the basic consumer. They buy these devices that "just work". They don't worry about any of the details. So the markets flood with these devices with...
This ties into a major problem I have with the basic consumer. They buy these devices that "just work". They don't worry about any of the details. So the markets flood with these devices with major flaws / holes.
I kind of want to experiment with this stuff. I wonder if it would be possible to capture packets to see what data is being sent and to where. I wonder if you could send bogus data. They lock devices down to make some of that stuff hard, but you'd think you could do it at the firewall level pretty easily. That would be a cool study.
I wonder what kind of data those TVs would collect for someone like me. Someone bought me a Roku TV and I really don't get it. It is so locked down and restricted. Doesn't even have a browser. I can't plug my phone or tablet it and get media that way. And in order to cast, I have to have an internet connection. It does let you plug a usb into it, but it gets old moving media to a usb, reaching around behind hte tv and plugging it in.
I don't pay for / use any streaming services. I watch a lot of stuff via antenna. My roku tv doesn't even have a youtube app and I can't find one in the apps you can download. But that is something I would use a lot. I just use the mlb.tv app, watch tv over antenna, or use plex when I have it up.
You'd think you could set some stuff up to prevent that data from leaving your network, and a VPN should encrypt it. I wonder what % make up people doing things like that.
Well it's often because they're not aware and "it just works", right? But it's also a trade off that many people are willing to make. I'm OK with broadcasting my location on my phone so I can use...
Well it's often because they're not aware and "it just works", right? But it's also a trade off that many people are willing to make. I'm OK with broadcasting my location on my phone so I can use GPS maps - that's a trade off I make quite a bit.
I think it's all about making informed choices. Personally, I want a third-party involved as little as possible.
On a side note, I believe there should be a YouTube app on Roku TV. I'll have to check when I get home - we have both a Roku TV and a Roku streaming box. It's definitely on the streaming box so I assume it should be available on the RokuTV as well.
Roku's are made for streaming - we use mostly Netflix, Amazon Video, Reuters News App (very nice), and Plex. The live TV feature on the Roku TVs is VERY cool. We don't cast anything, but I agree that should be easier.
How do you feel about Plex? I thoght about moving to XBMC (Kodi I think it's called now) because it's all OpenSource. I don't like that idea that whoever runs Plex potentially knows what I watch and when.
I don't know about anything about XBMC. I will have to look into it. I don't mind Plex. Like you said, it's a trade off. I like that I can stream my music from Plex anywhere. But there are...
I don't know about anything about XBMC. I will have to look into it. I don't mind Plex. Like you said, it's a trade off. I like that I can stream my music from Plex anywhere. But there are separate programs to do that too. Which makes more sense for me. I don't really want to expose Plex to the outside world, but I would like to expose my music library so I can stream without a VPN. I don't like to maintain a VPN on my home network, but it makes more sense because I can pull music and ebooks a lot easier instead of having to expose that stuff to the outside.
I don't mind sharing my location from my phone, but I do mind that Google took it upon itself to label my home and work. That is a little creepy. I need to just kill my gmail account, but I have had it since 2006... I use proton mail for personal email and gmail for junk.
But I am getting off topic. I think I'll look at TVs that use that Samba mentioned in the article or just known for collecting data in general and see what it actually sends out and examine some packets.
Off topic is fine I think :) How do you like protonmail? I thought about trying the free service. I heard something like it emails a link to other people instead of an actual email.. what's that...
Off topic is fine I think :)
How do you like protonmail? I thought about trying the free service. I heard something like it emails a link to other people instead of an actual email.. what's that about or did I just misunderstand?
XMBC/Kodi don't have sanctioned Roku apps so you'd have to move to a jailbroken FireTV stick or the like. I'm too invested in the Roku ecosystem to seriously consider it right now, but maybe down the line.
Regarding Plex privacy - I was more referring to the plex.tv site that lets you access your media online. I think this is a bit different from opening plex up for direct connections from other places. I found several Reddit threads on it and this seems to sum things up:
"Other than the library section names and IDs of those sections, all of the posters, metadata, etc is retrieved directly from your home server. You may not have enabled port forwarding on your router, but believe it or not, Plex probably has. It uses a feature called UPnP (or NAT-PMP if you're lucky enough to have a router that supports it). Basically Plex asks your router for an open port, and if one is available, it forwards it for Plex on-demand. If you open up a web inspector on Chrome on plex.tv/web you will see a bunch of requests like /recentlyAdded, /onDeck, etc made directly to your home IP address rather than plex.tv :)"
I really like Proton Mail. I have two custom domains set up for it. I pay $66 a year and this is year 1 for me. My plan comes with 5 addresses. You can set up an @pm.me address to shorten down...
I really like Proton Mail. I have two custom domains set up for it. I pay $66 a year and this is year 1 for me. My plan comes with 5 addresses. You can set up an @pm.me address to shorten down @protonmail.com.
The link thing is true for encrypted mail. You can send a normal email to someone who does not have PM and the email opens normally. If you send an encrypted email to someone who does not have PM, then you set a pass and an optional hint. When they get it, they click a link in the form of a button and it opens the encrypted mail on PM's site. (asks for password) This is to prevent things like GMail, Yahoo, etc from getting the encrypted content. A very cool feature is encrypted contacts. Which journalists can use or security contractors.
XMBC/Kodi don't have sanctioned Roku apps so you'd have to move to a jailbroken FireTV stick or the like
That is a huge problem I have with Roku stuff and the smart stuff on the market. It is all locked down and you can't use whatever you want like you can on a PC.
The whole Plex port forwarding your stuff for you. That is insane. You'd think that would be illegal. This is why more people need to know what is going on with their stuff. Applications just running over open ports like that to snake your data is absurd. That's just one more reason to close all ports you're not using. And restrict IPs that can connect over the ones that are open.
Well the benefit of XBMC/Kodi is that it's 100% OpenSource but that means it's also rife with coypright abuse - a common thing is to download plugins that lets you stream movies illegally. I agree...
Well the benefit of XBMC/Kodi is that it's 100% OpenSource but that means it's also rife with coypright abuse - a common thing is to download plugins that lets you stream movies illegally.
I agree about Plex, but there really isn't another way for it to work without sharing even more info with the company that makes Plex.
Have you heard of Richard Stallman? He invented the GNU part of GNU/Linux. I mention him because your views seem to coincide with some of his. Here's his home page if you want to learn more: https://www.stallman.org/#
EDIT: Oh and thank you for the info about Protonmail. I'll be checking them out :)
I've never understood smart TVs in general. Why would you want a TV that has built-in software you can't control that is connected to the internet, capable of tracking what you do, and far worse...
I've never understood smart TVs in general. Why would you want a TV that has built-in software you can't control that is connected to the internet, capable of tracking what you do, and far worse than just plugging in a separate box that does streaming better? It would be cheaper anyway for companies to just not include "smart" features in their TVs, and just let the customers buy separate hardware.
Yeah, it really sucks how "dumb" TVs are basically nonexistent at this point. I don't want my TV to have a shitty built-in processor to run Android, I just want it to display video from an input.
Yeah, it really sucks how "dumb" TVs are basically nonexistent at this point. I don't want my TV to have a shitty built-in processor to run Android, I just want it to display video from an input.
At this point, everything is a Smart TV now. All of those manufacturers see dollar signs attached to selling the info they get from invading your living room. The actual manufacturing costs of...
At this point, everything is a Smart TV now. All of those manufacturers see dollar signs attached to selling the info they get from invading your living room. The actual manufacturing costs of adding a computer to the TV are almost non-existent, it isn't costing them anything - and it's become one of those mee-too gotta-compete features now that everyone has simply adopted wholesale.
My idea of a Smart TV is any dumb terminal plugged into a PC I've built. I run a VLAN now at home on my green segment just to deal with this phone-home crap, and if the system isn't on the VLAN, it has no internet access (plus I'm logging what it does).
If/when my current set dies, I'll have to buy a Smart TV... which I'll simply set to a single input, no network access, and have it display only what's coming from my receiver - then I'll attach a Kodi box to do literally everything else. At least with Kodi I know I'm not being spied on, and it keeps everything local unless you ask it to do lookups online or load streaming apps.
How long I wonder until we see Smart TVs that stop operating if they lose internet access for more than a couple of weeks?
Honestly, way more concerning to me than that article (which was pretty concerning, to be sure) was the linked article to another Times piece about Alphonso actually using users‘ microphones to...
This ties into a major problem I have with the basic consumer. They buy these devices that "just work". They don't worry about any of the details. So the markets flood with these devices with major flaws / holes.
I kind of want to experiment with this stuff. I wonder if it would be possible to capture packets to see what data is being sent and to where. I wonder if you could send bogus data. They lock devices down to make some of that stuff hard, but you'd think you could do it at the firewall level pretty easily. That would be a cool study.
I wonder what kind of data those TVs would collect for someone like me. Someone bought me a Roku TV and I really don't get it. It is so locked down and restricted. Doesn't even have a browser. I can't plug my phone or tablet it and get media that way. And in order to cast, I have to have an internet connection. It does let you plug a usb into it, but it gets old moving media to a usb, reaching around behind hte tv and plugging it in.
I don't pay for / use any streaming services. I watch a lot of stuff via antenna. My roku tv doesn't even have a youtube app and I can't find one in the apps you can download. But that is something I would use a lot. I just use the mlb.tv app, watch tv over antenna, or use plex when I have it up.
You'd think you could set some stuff up to prevent that data from leaving your network, and a VPN should encrypt it. I wonder what % make up people doing things like that.
Well it's often because they're not aware and "it just works", right? But it's also a trade off that many people are willing to make. I'm OK with broadcasting my location on my phone so I can use GPS maps - that's a trade off I make quite a bit.
I think it's all about making informed choices. Personally, I want a third-party involved as little as possible.
On a side note, I believe there should be a YouTube app on Roku TV. I'll have to check when I get home - we have both a Roku TV and a Roku streaming box. It's definitely on the streaming box so I assume it should be available on the RokuTV as well.
Roku's are made for streaming - we use mostly Netflix, Amazon Video, Reuters News App (very nice), and Plex. The live TV feature on the Roku TVs is VERY cool. We don't cast anything, but I agree that should be easier.
How do you feel about Plex? I thoght about moving to XBMC (Kodi I think it's called now) because it's all OpenSource. I don't like that idea that whoever runs Plex potentially knows what I watch and when.
I don't know about anything about XBMC. I will have to look into it. I don't mind Plex. Like you said, it's a trade off. I like that I can stream my music from Plex anywhere. But there are separate programs to do that too. Which makes more sense for me. I don't really want to expose Plex to the outside world, but I would like to expose my music library so I can stream without a VPN. I don't like to maintain a VPN on my home network, but it makes more sense because I can pull music and ebooks a lot easier instead of having to expose that stuff to the outside.
I don't mind sharing my location from my phone, but I do mind that Google took it upon itself to label my home and work. That is a little creepy. I need to just kill my gmail account, but I have had it since 2006... I use proton mail for personal email and gmail for junk.
But I am getting off topic. I think I'll look at TVs that use that Samba mentioned in the article or just known for collecting data in general and see what it actually sends out and examine some packets.
Off topic is fine I think :)
How do you like protonmail? I thought about trying the free service. I heard something like it emails a link to other people instead of an actual email.. what's that about or did I just misunderstand?
XMBC/Kodi don't have sanctioned Roku apps so you'd have to move to a jailbroken FireTV stick or the like. I'm too invested in the Roku ecosystem to seriously consider it right now, but maybe down the line.
Regarding Plex privacy - I was more referring to the plex.tv site that lets you access your media online. I think this is a bit different from opening plex up for direct connections from other places. I found several Reddit threads on it and this seems to sum things up:
"Other than the library section names and IDs of those sections, all of the posters, metadata, etc is retrieved directly from your home server. You may not have enabled port forwarding on your router, but believe it or not, Plex probably has. It uses a feature called UPnP (or NAT-PMP if you're lucky enough to have a router that supports it). Basically Plex asks your router for an open port, and if one is available, it forwards it for Plex on-demand. If you open up a web inspector on Chrome on plex.tv/web you will see a bunch of requests like /recentlyAdded, /onDeck, etc made directly to your home IP address rather than plex.tv :)"
https://www.reddit.com/r/PleX/comments/1vzyee/is_sharing_safe/
I really like Proton Mail. I have two custom domains set up for it. I pay $66 a year and this is year 1 for me. My plan comes with 5 addresses. You can set up an @pm.me address to shorten down @protonmail.com.
The link thing is true for encrypted mail. You can send a normal email to someone who does not have PM and the email opens normally. If you send an encrypted email to someone who does not have PM, then you set a pass and an optional hint. When they get it, they click a link in the form of a button and it opens the encrypted mail on PM's site. (asks for password) This is to prevent things like GMail, Yahoo, etc from getting the encrypted content. A very cool feature is encrypted contacts. Which journalists can use or security contractors.
That is a huge problem I have with Roku stuff and the smart stuff on the market. It is all locked down and you can't use whatever you want like you can on a PC.
The whole Plex port forwarding your stuff for you. That is insane. You'd think that would be illegal. This is why more people need to know what is going on with their stuff. Applications just running over open ports like that to snake your data is absurd. That's just one more reason to close all ports you're not using. And restrict IPs that can connect over the ones that are open.
Well the benefit of XBMC/Kodi is that it's 100% OpenSource but that means it's also rife with coypright abuse - a common thing is to download plugins that lets you stream movies illegally.
I agree about Plex, but there really isn't another way for it to work without sharing even more info with the company that makes Plex.
Have you heard of Richard Stallman? He invented the GNU part of GNU/Linux. I mention him because your views seem to coincide with some of his. Here's his home page if you want to learn more: https://www.stallman.org/#
EDIT: Oh and thank you for the info about Protonmail. I'll be checking them out :)
Yeah, I like watching Stallman stuff on youtube. Never been to his site though.
I've never understood smart TVs in general. Why would you want a TV that has built-in software you can't control that is connected to the internet, capable of tracking what you do, and far worse than just plugging in a separate box that does streaming better? It would be cheaper anyway for companies to just not include "smart" features in their TVs, and just let the customers buy separate hardware.
Yeah, it really sucks how "dumb" TVs are basically nonexistent at this point. I don't want my TV to have a shitty built-in processor to run Android, I just want it to display video from an input.
At this point, everything is a Smart TV now. All of those manufacturers see dollar signs attached to selling the info they get from invading your living room. The actual manufacturing costs of adding a computer to the TV are almost non-existent, it isn't costing them anything - and it's become one of those mee-too gotta-compete features now that everyone has simply adopted wholesale.
My idea of a Smart TV is any dumb terminal plugged into a PC I've built. I run a VLAN now at home on my green segment just to deal with this phone-home crap, and if the system isn't on the VLAN, it has no internet access (plus I'm logging what it does).
If/when my current set dies, I'll have to buy a Smart TV... which I'll simply set to a single input, no network access, and have it display only what's coming from my receiver - then I'll attach a Kodi box to do literally everything else. At least with Kodi I know I'm not being spied on, and it keeps everything local unless you ask it to do lookups online or load streaming apps.
How long I wonder until we see Smart TVs that stop operating if they lose internet access for more than a couple of weeks?
Honestly, way more concerning to me than that article (which was pretty concerning, to be sure) was the linked article to another Times piece about Alphonso actually using users‘ microphones to record ultrasonic fingerprints of TV shows and ads that users were watching while playing games on their phones. It‘s kind of horrifying to me that I didn’t even hear about what I feel like should have been a massive story about privacy and consent.