"They can't spy on our people, only we can spy on our people!"
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Fuck Paxton, except for right now for this specific thing, but everything else, fuck Paxton.
Articles are like this are weird where they warn of what China can do with this data, but somehow the Fascists States of Assholia can be trusted.
The whole world needs to abandon surveilance tech.
The Texas Attorney General sued five major television manufacturers, accusing them of illegally collecting their users' data by secretly recording what they watch using Automated Content Recognition (ACR) technology.
The lawsuits target Sony, Samsung, LG, and China-based companies Hisense and TCL Technology Group Corporation. Attorney General Ken Paxton's office also highlighted "serious concerns" about the two Chinese companies being required to follow China's National Security Law, which could give the Chinese government access to U.S. consumers' data.
Well good on you Texas for taking the initiative.
So to be clear, this is the right thing for the wrong reason. If Westinghouse still made TVs and they were doing this too, I would bet a year’s salary that they wouldn’t be included in the suit (as long as they were shoving their data in a US data center).
How long ago was it that someone would say there is secret recording technology capturing screenshots of what I watch on TV, sending it up to third parties, including the Govt, and selling it to others? You would be labelled as crazy. The boiling frog approach to build a surveillance prison around everyone while they just accept it is fascinating.
It would have been crazy in the CRT age and maybe the early LCD age. But then we got screens that require significant electronics to even be able to show an image, built into smart internet-connected TV’s which sometimes also have microphones and cameras built in. At the same time we also kind of dropped actual TV, and switched to streaming, where the streaming provider automatically and necessarily knows exactly what you watch, when you’re awake, what languages you speak, and so on.
Which IMHO makes it even more crazy to say it. Like why would a sane person say any of this is secret.
Not too long ago.
But when you set up things like AdGuard at home, you'll quickly see that most people are probably not nearly paranoid enough. I work in IT, and even others in IT that should in theory know better think I'm being too paranoid to use various protections when using the 'net.
I don't even have that many IoT devices in my house or enshittified products like Alexa, etc...and something like 20+% of DNS queries are blocked in my house...
I have Samsung in my house and of course they were known for being the worst/earliest offender when it came to "smart TVs", but they are hardly the only one. Certainly you can do a lot to block them, but I am quite sure most people never even bother.
Can't wait until someone tells them about Windows 11.
I like how you don't even bother to read the article before commenting.
Actually, I did. Where is this addressed?
Literally in the first paragraph. It's not a lawsuit about the ability to take screenshots, it's the fact that they were taking screenshots and collecting the data illegally. Windows does not do that.
Jesus Christ, literacy in this country is fucking dead.
Since you insist on ignorance, and going off old information, maybe try reading something current.
- It still hasn't been implemented.
- You need to turn it on for it to be active.
- Recall needs to be turned on for it to take screenshots.
- In order for recall to take screenshots, you have to actively turn it on.
- Recall is not actively taking screenshots unless you turn it on.
- To turn it on or off, it's located in the settings menu, and very simple to press the toggle.
- In order for recall to take screenshots, you need to turn it on.
What part is so difficult to understand?
They projected so hard I thought I was three days in at a French Film Festival
Now you have to opt-in (in theory, according to Microsoft, who historically aren't terribly trustworthy about such things).
When the feature was first created, and released to a group of end-users who have opted into the "insider program" to get new features earlier than most people, it wasn't opt-in
Huh... it's always nice to see Texas do something right for once.
Wait until Texas learns that their trucks track everywhere they go and how long they stay there
A broken clock and all.
I'm so tired of "smart" tech. "Smart" is becoming synonymous with abuse. Seems like that's all these companies do with it.
Every time I buy any piece of technology, seeing "smart" in the title makes me immediately look for something else.
I want a label printer. Not something that only works with a mobile app, not something that requires proprietary drivers and doesn't work on my OS, not something that can only be used with your specific software, not one that requires your labels with a special NFC tag to use, just a label printer that is just as compatible as any regular printer.
I ended up paying about a 5X premium compared to alternatives on the market for that, and I would do it again.
Meanwhile, also in Texas, the police will trawl cameras nationwide to track you if you get an abortion. I guess it's OK as long as it's their surveillance network.
Lol, it's like this with everything.
USA is tracking every single movement in your house, and throws a fit when China collects some meta data.
They just act like the survelliance is bad by blaming a foregin state, then doing something way worse.
Is an Administration that has been fighting against the right to privacy now trying to make an argument based upon privacy?
If you connect you TV directly to the internet, that's on you at this point.
I get what you’re saying, and I accept that reality for most of us here who already understand these things. But blaming consumers for corporate surveillance is not a good way to get corporations to stop surveilling consumers.
Right it only makes people feed shame and then be quiet for "falling for a scam" that invaded their privacy and double down. We can argue about how when you get scammed you should talk about it etc, but that's how people operate. The others are just apathetic about privacy being dead.
I mean I hate to say it, but at this point what are our options? Because our elected representatives refuse to do their jobs and these corps keep doing shady shit without consequences. I don't mean to victim blame or anything, but with the current state of affairs, the onus is on the user to protect themselves.
our elected representatives refuse to do their jobs
This is under a post about elected representatives quite literally doing their jobs and suing corporations for doing this.
They might be couching it in language about it all being because of the "Chinese Communist Party surveilling Americans", but they're still trying to stop the practice.
the onus is on the user to protect themselves.
It's good when users can protect themselves. It's easy to forget that these companies design their products specifically to make people set them up how the manufacturer wants, and not all of them will even work without being connected to the internet.
The average person is not technically literate whatsoever. You're telling people to take personal responsibility for their privacy when they barely know how any technology works, and are surrounded by corporations who's budgets go towards finding new ways to convince people to give up their privacy in the most effective ways.
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