Conncting a TV to the Internet?

[Radio Fixer]

Once upon a time there was a thread on this and I think it was Nick who advised against doing it.  The reason was that it could be a security weakness and a back door into your computer on the same Wi-Fi set up.  I didnt and still cant imagine how this could be ...

Anyway as we are getting a new Intenet ready TV I will ask again:  shall I hook it up to the Wi-Fi.  I probably would hardly use it but my wife might.  Of course the easy thing for me is to say nothing about it ...

Anybody use their TV in this way and is it a useful thing to do?

thanks  Gary

[westcliff]

Hello Gary,

Our TV has been on the wi-fi for years and we use its smart features all the time.  My son in particular can't imagine life without it.

Gus.

[Mark Hennessy]

If you can run an Ethernet cable, so much the better. Depends on your environment, of course, but wi-fi is a bit tricky here because the two houses either side of me have been carved up into flats, each with their own wi-fi networks (3 on each side!). As a result, there's a lot of interference. I've had to buy a dedicated wi-fi access point and mount it in a different part of the house to the router, in order to get the best coverage. But I digress...

So yes, we have a wired connection to both our TV and our Bluray player. Both work really well.

The TV is a cheap Sony - no idea what the OS is, but doubt it's Android because Sony make that a selling point of their more expensive TVs. My experiences with Android have been less than good, so I wouldn't actively seek it out in a TV or any other domestic appliance that I expected to last more than a couple of years. Likewise, I wouldn't want a TV with a microphone fitted for voice control - it's not that I'm especially paranoid, I just don't like talking to machines (never use Siri or talk to Cortana or even a car with voice control. Can barely cope with answerphones!). Apart from that, I've no worries with relatively dumb "smart TVs".

They can also play back media files from a server on your home network if you have one. It works well enough, though our cheap TV doesn't have terribly good "shuttle" controls for fast-forwarding and rewinding. I'm a bit "old-school", so most of what I watch is from those funny silver discs that people used to have

[valvekits]

I read all the terms and conditions during the set-up of my smart TV and discovered that I would have been agreeing to them collecting a fair bit of data including automatic content recognition had I not unchecked some of the boxes.

Eddie

[Radio Fixer]

Thanks to all
Will connect it up... another thing to play with while we are shut down

Gary

[Nick]

There was a specific problem with certain makes of "smart" TVs that had cameras and microphones that could be hijacked to spy into your room.

I believe that is all sorted long ago, however, as you've noticed, they may still collect a bucket load of data from your set.

[Mike Watterson]

There was a specific problem with certain makes of "smart" TVs that had cameras and microphones that could be hijacked to spy into your room.

I believe that is all sorted long ago, however, as you've noticed, they may still collect a bucket load of data from your set.

Google DOES collect the microphone sounds. Also all titles of video player connected by HDMI are sent as well as usage of channels and apps.
They are still insecure periodically. Nothing is "sorted".
It's best to use a phone, tablet or laptop. HDMI is best, VGA next and Screencasting is a step back compared to older phones and tablets with micro HDMI ports.

It's best to NEVER connect the TV to ethernet or WiFi but use a laptop.

[Nick]

Not sure what Google had to do with this unless you're using a Chromecast or Google home etc.

Settop boxes generally have a data collection opt-out setting.

On our Humax box, it's under Settings->System information->Data permissions.

I've logged all data uplinked from this connection (I have a decent Ubiquiti setup that allows this) and over a week, there was no uplinked data to anything other than iPlayer & Netflix etc. i.e. expected IPs.

[Radio Fixer]

OK so contrary opinions. I will explore the security settings. May go for a connection if it doesn't look too dangerous.

thanks again Gary

[Murphyv310]

Personally I only use a smart TV for Netflix, YouTube etc not for browsing the web, banking apps etc. I'd also not buy a set with a microphone and if it was inevitable I'd disconnect it.
A TV is for watching Corrie, news etc, if you want to go online use a laptop etc, just my opinion.