LG TV shown capable of tracking user activity, even when offline - Ars Technica

Overview

LG TV shown capable of tracking user activity, even when offlinevar abtest_2170944 = new ABTest(2170944, 'click');

LG TVs are facing scrutiny due to a video seemingly showing the devices’ capability to track users when the TVs are off.

Details

You Tube channel Gamers Nexus worked with Level 1 Techs, a technology-focused You Tube channel, and security researchers to analyze LG TVs’ tracking capabilities. They shared packet captures that pointed to the TVs, including LG’s pricey G5 OLED TV, scanning the LAN for other devices.

“The [G5] crawled our entire network and found dozens of unrelated devices, including smartwatches and phones of our staff who didn’t even know we were working on this,” Steve Burke, Gamers Nexus’ editor-in-chief, said.

Gamers Nexus’ video shows results from Wireshark testing of LG’s OLED65G3PUA, which currently has a starting MSRP of $2,500.

LG’s ad business, LG Ad Solutions, has said in recent marketing materials that it can reach 363 million “addressable secondary devices” in the US.

The You Tube channel used Wireshark, a network protocol analyzer tool, and inspected the TV’s firmware and found that LG TVs “are capable of identifying your IP address, geographic location, name of every Wi-Fi network in the vicinity and signal strength, channel numbers of neighboring Wi-Fi networks in range, and other devices on the network, even if not connected to the TV in any way, and the internal IP address of other devices on the network, alongside others.”

It’s unclear if LG TVs use this functionality for any purposes beyond advertising, such as diagnostics, or if this information is all sent to LG. It remains concerning, however, that devices with this technology are sitting in unsuspecting owners’ homes.

“This is the TV’s native functionality. This didn’t require vulnerabilities,” Burke noted.

Burke pointed out that “even using an LG smart TV as a dumb monitor doesn’t necessarily stop all of the functionality we’re talking about today,” while pointing to broader implications for non-LG smart TVs. He explained further:

Internet service providers sometimes have dual SSIDs that include open neighborhood Wi-Fi broadcast from customer routers, such as with Comcast’s Xfinity neighborhood hotspot and AT&T’s public hotspots, which are sometimes autoconnected to by devices when they discover the open network, such as in an apartment building from neighbors using such routers. So this is a concern broadly speaking and future looking for smart TVs regardless of the brand.

Internet service providers sometimes have dual SSIDs that include open neighborhood Wi-Fi broadcast from customer routers, such as with Comcast’s Xfinity neighborhood hotspot and AT&T’s public hotspots, which are sometimes autoconnected to by devices when they discover the open network, such as in an apartment building from neighbors using such routers. So this is a concern broadly speaking and future looking for smart TVs regardless of the brand.

An LG representative acknowledged receipt of Ars Technica’s request for comment on the video. We’ll update this post if we hear back.

The video also demonstrated an LG TV’s ability to record sound around it, even when the TV isn’t online.

“We were even able to capture microphone audio while the TV was unplugged from the network. Burke said the audio was reportedly stored locally via plaintext, which could potentially allow the data to be sent to LG [if] the TV connects online again.”

Level 1 Techs’ representative, Wendell Wilson, noted that “it doesn’t cost a lot to store text forever.”

The video underscores the myriad privacy concerns surrounding smart TVs. Many users are unaware of the various ways that smart TVs can track the activity of people in the home, and many presume (and reasonably so) that the TV isn’t tracking anything if it’s not connected to the Internet.

Per Gamers Nexus’ report, it’s possible that LG TVs can track user activity when they’re used as dumb displays and subsequently share that data with LG should the device be connected to the Internet.

The video also highlights the complexities of understanding user agreements and the concerning level of interest that smart TV manufacturers and operating system (OS) owners have in building products that can monitor users’ activity, even clandestinely. Smart TV OS operators lament struggling to reconcile the wants of advertisers with customers’ right to privacy.

While this is a concern for all smart TV brands, LG TVs’ reported behavior is of particular interest because the company is known for making some of the most expensive, high-end TVs. It has garnered a reputation for fewer ads and less user tracking than budget brands, but that reputation is under new scrutiny.

That includes last month’s revelation that LG monitors were installing Mc Afee ads onto connected Windows PCs.

With all this in mind, you may want to check out Ars’ guide for avoiding smart TV ads and tracking.

And you can watch Gamers Nexus’ video, which also includes discussion of remote code execution vulnerabilities currently going through the disclosure process, below:

1.          EV batteries last longer than drivers feared
   

2.          Tesla’s Cybercab has been deployed, and it’s already under investigation
   

3.          The complex corporate web behind a $3.2 billion AI data center
   

4.          Nearly impossible? How Fairphone built the ethical, repairable Fairphone Gen 6+
   

5.          With another huge infusion of cash, Stoke Space goes even bigger
   

Ars Technica has been separating the signal from the noise for over 25 years. With our unique combination of technical savvy and wide-ranging interest in the technological arts and sciences, Ars is the trusted source in a sea of information. After all, you don’t need to know everything, only what’s important.

Key Takeaways

• LG TV shown capable of tracking user activity, even when offlinevar abtest_2170944 = new ABTest(2170944, 'click');

• LG TVs are facing scrutiny due to a video seemingly showing the devices’ capability to track users when the TVs are off

• You Tube channel Gamers Nexus worked with Level 1 Techs, a technology-focused You Tube channel, and security researchers to analyze LG TVs’ tracking capabilities

• “The [G5] crawled our entire network and found dozens of unrelated devices, including smartwatches and phones of our staff who didn’t even know we were working on this,” Steve Burke, Gamers Nexus’ editor-in-chief, said

• Gamers Nexus’ video shows results from Wireshark testing of LG’s OLED65G3PUA, which currently has a starting MSRP of $2,500