Your Smart TV May Be Engaged in Intelligence Work
Back in 2013, we mused about the seeming disconnect between public outrage at NSA data mining and the lack of comparable outrage with respect to private data mining. Nancy Kim and I have been writing in this area, and a recent report in the ABA Journal provides additional fodder for our scholarship.
One of the things that makes television’s “smart” these days is that they have the ability to respond to voice commands. If you have this feature on, the television transmits your information to a third party, according to Samsung. If you turn the voice recognition feature off, your television still gathers the data but it does not transmit it.
Over at Salon, Michael Price gives us reasons why we should be afraid of our smart tvs. Having reviewed his television’s 46-page privacy policy, Price concludes that it has the capability to collect a staggering amount of data. One could turn off the television’s “smart” features, but that can affect your television’s ability to do some of the things you bought it for. Just as we cannot choose which channels the cable providers send us, we can only choose from packages, we apparently cannot choose to have a television with some “smart” features unless we are willing to invite Big Brother into our living rooms.