I've been thinking about privacy a bit lately, and wanted to share a couple of items that I think are against the best interests of most Americans.

1) We will need an internet connection to view over-the-air TV, if the National Association of Broadcasters get their way. In short, local broadcasters want to be able to compete with cable/internet TV and that requires being able to use the same sort of tracking that Google TV etc. use, so that data can be sold to advertisers (targeted advertising). This is in front of the FCC now.

2) Almost all new TVs take input frames (from a computer, your cable, your gaming console) and transmit them back to the manufacturer. This is generally done using hashing (converting the image into a code), but it could also include transmitting the actual "screen shot". This happens 100's of times per second

This is then matched against vast libraries (that include YouTube videos, TV programming, eveb personal images and videos, ...) to determine what you are viewing (Automatic Content Recognition- ACR). Even if you figure out how to deactivate this, your TV will likely lose some or all functionality.

My thoughts.
1) Local broadcasters should go "take a piss". Local TV stations are using public airways, and it is only in their best interest to go down this path, not ours.

2) The TV industry is always against the streaming of content they cannot control, unless (of course) it is our content and that seems to be fair game.

We need laws allowing our opting out of ACR, without penalty, as TV manufacturers viewing, recognizing, and selling our usage of content that they did not create is a gross violation of our privacy and could be classified (imo) as unlawful enrichment.

Consumer Reports: "How to Stop Your Smart TV From Spying on You"
https://www.consumerreports.org/electronics-computers/tvs/how-to-stop-your-smart-tv-from-spying-on-you-a1080751039/

NAB Petition for Rulemaking: Establishing a Clear Timeline for the ATSC 3.0 Transition - Filed February 26, 2025, to the FCC, proposing deadlines (e.g., full transition in top markets by Feb. 2028).
https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-25-314A1.pdf This covers NAB's requests alongside public comments on encryption/internet issues.

But did you like "Stranger Things"?

I have ADHDTV.

I never see commercials.

Local channels could build apps and put them out there for free along with the coverage similar to an antenna. Take a chuck out of their competitors.

Quote:

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There is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are controlling transmission.

If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the volume. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a whisper. We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical. We can roll the image, make it flutter.

We can change the focus to a soft blur or sharpen it to crystal clarity. For the next hour, sit quietly, and we will control all that you see and hear.

We repeat: There is nothing wrong with your television set.

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96AgGrad said:

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Nope. they don't have this tech. And the EU stops it under privacy laws. Only in the land of the free.

Omperlodge said:

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Local channels could build apps and put them out there for free along with the coverage similar to an antenna. Take a chuck out of their competitors.

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Not really. Most of their content is licensed from the major studios and can't be streamed.

If you want to get away from ACR, don't ever connect your TV to the internet. Use something like an Apple TV.

ATSC 3.0 nextgen is going to be a disaster for OTA TV and probably be the end of it. FCC will take that spectrum for something else eventually.

Just saw today Amazon will start blocking sideloading of "piracy" apps on FireTV devices. Of course they have an incentive to do this, since they've effectively been a studio for a decade

Y'all are thinking about this am I am looking at the Neo robot wondering if it's going to be some pervert
guy in India on a VR head set operating it and is it really that bad. For $20K and $499 a month. What could be so bad about that? At least my house will be clean.

Regarding 2), that doesn't seem quite right. Most 4K signals are still only refreshing 60 frames a second so "100's" of times a second would be massive redundant information.

Plus, I think there has to be a better way to capture what is being shown on screen then using ACR.

And if you are worried about someone tracking what you watch on TV you are likely overlooking big data privacy lapses elsewhere.

Broadcast TV ends under Trump. As another mentioned, the bandwidth is too valuable vs the value brought by broadcast TV.

Now, if you really want to be paranoid about your smart Tv… if it's connected to the internet it can be used in a variety of ways to monitor the interior activity of your home.

If you don't want your data shared, unplug yourself and stay in a dark closet and never communicate with anyone ever again.

BTW EU privacy laws are designed to give the authorities MORE control over your information, not less. It may limit commercialization of such information but it's not providing citizens additional privacy.

IIIHorn said:

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I have ADHDTV.

I never see commercials.

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WOW! I didn't even realize there was special tv for people with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder!

Over_ed said:

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96AgGrad said:

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Nope. they don't have this tech. And the EU stops it under privacy laws. Only in the land of the free.

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They certainly do not have it, because they have not existed since December 1991.

flown-the-coop said:

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Regarding 2), that doesn't seem quite right. Most 4K signals are still only refreshing 60 frames a second so "100's" of times a second would be massive redundant information.

Plus, I think there has to be a better way to capture what is being shown on screen then using ACR.

And if you are worried about someone tracking what you watch on TV you are likely overlooking big data privacy lapses elsewhere.

Broadcast TV ends under Trump. As another mentioned, the bandwidth is too valuable vs the value brought by broadcast TV.

Now, if you really want to be paranoid about your smart Tv… if it's connected to the internet it can be used in a variety of ways to monitor the interior activity of your home.

If you don't want your data shared, unplug yourself and stay in a dark closet and never communicate with anyone ever again.

BTW EU privacy laws are designed to give the authorities MORE control over your information, not less. It may limit commercialization of such information but it's not providing citizens additional privacy.

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I was a data scientist working for cable provider - I'm pretty up on the tech and how it can be used, although starting to get a bit dated.

Regarding 2), that doesn't seem quite right. Most 4K signals are still only refreshing 60 frames a second so "100's" of times a second would be massive redundant information.

Very correct, meant per minute. Looked at 2 , LG and Samsung - one was about 10X the speed, I wondered the same thing (what benefit the high sampling rate could possibly get them). My guess, when the do the hash comparison in their library is maybe every 10-20 frames, so they have to "over" sample to get a match.

If you don't want your data shared, unplug yourself and stay in a dark closet and never communicate with anyone ever again.
And if you are worried about someone tracking what you watch on TV you are likely overlooking big data privacy lapses elsewhere.

I am relatively old; it is unlikely to bite me in the butt. If the companies have it, so does the government. If the government has it, they will eventually use it. That is not going to be good. It will amount to a scorecard at some point, imo. These threads usually are lightly attended, but I want folks to know that this is happening. BTW, ACR and hash-matching is designed to keep the bandwidth demand light, that is why they use it.

titan said:

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Over_ed said:

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96AgGrad said:

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Nope. they don't have this tech. And the EU stops it under privacy laws. Only in the land of the free.

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They certainly do not have it, because they have not existed since December 1991.

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Ah, the fall. I literally cried for joy when the wall fell. which was the biggest tell the world was changing. I was stationed in West Berlin and went frequently to the East. What a dump, and it was filled with Russian tourists looking down their noses at the E. Germans.

Why would you hook your tv to the internet?

Use an Apple TV media streamer. Better for privacy.

They're really going to struggle to target their advertising dollars to me. I literally watch a few commercials a month and those are ones I'm forced to sit through. I rarely watch any live TV. If I watch Youtube TV almost everything I watch is recorded or behind. I fast forward through them all.

Recorded shows are now locked from skipping the commercials.

You either pay for the content, watch commercials or some combination thereof.

My 80yo FIL struggles with this concept, but it seems to pass right over many people who think they will find the magical unicorn of good content, free streaming, no commercials.

And is Apple TV some sort of magical contraption that provides privacy? Because refer to the above. Apple is either going to charge you out the posterior orifice for not capturing all the data you can or is going to monetize it one way or another no matter what Tim Cook may get up on stage and sache about.

agracer said:

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Recorded shows are now locked from skipping the commercials.

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You mean on DVRs? You don't mean using fast-forward do you?

Most "DVR" is now cloud-based and it's probably not even fair to call it DVR anymore. More like a bookmark in the cloud to come back and watch later. So the host can insert, remove, restrict forwarding (pause and rewind) to their heart's and wallet's content.

You would have to go back to a VCR for true ability to play the content as desired.

flown-the-coop said:

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Most "DVR" is now cloud-based and it's probably not even fair to call it DVR anymore. More like a bookmark in the cloud to come back and watch later. So the host can insert, remove, restrict forwarding (pause and rewind) to their heart's and wallet's content.

You would have to go back to a VCR for true ability to play the content as desired.

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Ah, by "cloud based" you mean the difference between watching true Spectrum DVR recordings and watching on Amazon Prime or similar online. So the former has basically gone away whenever next replace it.

titan said:

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flown-the-coop said:

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Most "DVR" is now cloud-based and it's probably not even fair to call it DVR anymore. More like a bookmark in the cloud to come back and watch later. So the host can insert, remove, restrict forwarding (pause and rewind) to their heart's and wallet's content.

You would have to go back to a VCR for true ability to play the content as desired.

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Ah, by "cloud based" you mean the difference between watching true Spectrum DVR recordings and watching on Amazon Prime or similar online. So the former has basically gone away whenever next replace it.

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The concept of a set-top box at your home with an internal hard drive that maintains digital recordings of your shows is going away and for many is already gone. I am not sure DirecTV even offers equipment with a physical hard drive. The DirecTV Stream "Genie" boxes are nothing more than glorified Android TV sticks.

And these services can go away, change, add titles, remove titles and all that will affect your ability to access that content in the future. Not to stray too much, but if you "purchase" a move from Prime Video or Apple TV, I believe you are actually purchasing a license to access that content on that service for as long as that service owns or has rights to that content.

If you buy 'Best Little *****house in Texas' from Prime Video in order to watch the football team dance a jig and you paid $19.99 for the UHD version, then when Netflix comes along and purchases the rights to the contents in order to be the exclusive streamer of such a classic, then Prime removes it and your $19.99 is in purgatory. At least that is my current understanding of this and my experience of having to buy stuff over and over.

To the topic, the government may need to intervene in some area and one I would like to see them act or for the consumers to protest more on is paying for content once, particularly if it is offered as a purchase vs rent when in reality its rent vs long term lease that may end at any time.

Kristen Walker and her Meet the Press jerk offs are letting Newsome spew his nonsense lies unchallenged. He throws everyone under the bus and then claims Joe Biden was the greatest president in his lifetime. What a joke.

Dirty_Mike&the_boys said:

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Kristen Walker and her Meet the Press jerk offs are letting Newsome spew his nonsense lies unchallenged. He throws everyone under the bus and then claims Joe Biden was the greatest president in his lifetime. What a joke.

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That's won't work. First all but those already voting Left now are pretty clued in that the Media is pro-Democrat, period, without compromise or credibility. Gen Z especially knows.

Even for those you might be fooled,Newsome's trick won't work unless he includes Biden in that throwing under the bus. You can't defend Biden and remake your image.

Martin Cash said:

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IIIHorn said:

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I have ADHDTV.

I never see commercials.

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WOW! I didn't even realize there was special tv for people with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder!

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That is why I never see commercials.

Unless, of course, I can't reach the remote.

Which is why it is called a remote.

titan said:

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flown-the-coop said:

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Most "DVR" is now cloud-based and it's probably not even fair to call it DVR anymore. More like a bookmark in the cloud to come back and watch later. So the host can insert, remove, restrict forwarding (pause and rewind) to their heart's and wallet's content.

You would have to go back to a VCR for true ability to play the content as desired.

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Ah, by "cloud based" you mean the difference between watching true Spectrum DVR recordings and watching on Amazon Prime or similar online. So the former has basically gone away whenever next replace it.

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Yeah like all the Aggie Football I "recorded" this year on YTTV just "vanished" (same with the wife's Freeform/Disney Halloween movie "recordings")

Figured it might happen but is pretty glaring to wake up one day and all your "recorded" content is gone

I suppose you could always turn off your TV...or burn it.

I know I'm in the minority but I don't get the desperate need to have DVR capability. I've probably recorded something twice in a decade. Total non-factor feature for me. I've found that anything I might want to record (sports) are actually replayed 2-3 times later anyway.

The last thing I can even remember recording that I would watch again is the 2012 A&M-Miss St game and that solely because of a funny moment at the end of the first half that buddy and I liked watching over and over.