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New Anent.. Smart-TV thread below:
Friend, in the wilds of N. California: noted that her Smart-Bizness/but-NOT-User Tee Vee lately would screen stuff like: just after doing some search re say, 'Social Security'; this fucking-Spy-machine outta '1984' starts showing "suggestions" re SS. (I calls that a close-enough smoking-gun).

She's not tech ept but unusually ept at getting-self properly informed. A local whom she's used in past may prove a SYA for her. Her means of web access and which previously got her some local TV access--no longer works; as she puts it: maybe 16-18 destinations now (of quite more) esp. involving Euww-Tube-by-google-monolith. She deduced that she needs VPN as, her (entire home kluge) must communicate via HDMI--not bad for an amateur, I thought.

(My de-Smarted box [rilly cheap Vizio' /rilly boffo performance thus far) was direct-to-TV coax, solely. I surmise that this saved moi from ever giving it any Info about moi, thus accidentally defanged these info-suckers ... that rare case where Ignorance actually helped: I omitted even plugging-in any HDMI cable. (I no WiFi at all also helped.)

I'm also presuming that installing, using, + basic troubleshooting tips: come with whatever VPN service you pick, and the good fortune that she's got and used a local 'Pro' who seems not to need the ' ' around the title. She knows now a few queries to make re matching her limited-IT skillz to--maintenance of the changed overall system she uses/oft by cel-fone direct connection.

As she makes arrangements for The Pro to assist: she wonders, "how one decides Which One? of available streaming sites" ... should she choose? Any suggestions on that? h.d.f. Do you 'rate competing streaming services', anyway ?!. Just pick lowest cost?



Belated PROPS to all and esp. to The Admin who keeps us afloat--in a dinghy where the bailing-bucked: is still sealed in its plastic cover ;^>

:oTpy
Expand Edited by Ashton March 3, 2020, 02:42:00 PM EST
New 2+2=5?
Some things there just don't add up. HDMI is a digital AV cable. It has nothing to do with internet/network access. VPN can be used to securely connect LANs across the internet, or to obscure one's origin, but neither helps with the snooping TV. The thing will still connect to whatever server is programmed into it. (And the same applies if the TV is used as a browser. If it is sending that traffic to its mfg, a VPN will not make any difference.)

An outgoing filter on the network may (if possible to figure out the services it talks to, those comms can be blocked,) but then it may just decide to go off and sulk.

And VPNs are a can of worms all their own. She may find she's still the product, only to a different set of predators.
New GIG0, I guess..
She may have inferred "what she had plugged in", and I didn't offhand see the er, non-'connection'--bad dope.

As to my abscence of peeping anything at all of such snoop messages as D. reported, my Arris™ Surfboard modem to cable {ugh-Comcast} may?/must?/may-not have given their addy to my TV--but its use is as a mere TV-receiver; ia port on a sub-box from Comcast sends the RF-signal to TV, a separate multi-pin cable port --> iMac. ie no use of TV as a 'browser' evah.

tl;dr: never received any Vizio Setup message, so if it has Comcast data, it has yet to demonstrate anything: which I see doesn't mean that it doesn't harvest data to a fare-thee-well, but keeps silent.
{{sigh}} Poor Winston Smith--he tried to warn us, but NOOO..
Expand Edited by Ashton March 3, 2020, 09:50:46 PM EST
New Thanks. Again. for your pithy al-punte summary.
Passed on (for her to pass-on to local 'Pro-I hope'). IF she cannot do without 'WiFi enabled' and her browser-use depends on TV (as I think it does) ...
..glad it's beyond my Pay-grade :-)

(I merely hope that: my unwillingness to do-WiFi ackshully has disabled the means-to-snoop [???] of this idiot-Smart/otherwise acceptable Tee Vee-thing).



And people call ours: a 'Civilization'. (Moi calls it, Dachau-light).
     Anent.. Smart-TV thread below: - (Ashton) - (3)
         2+2=5? - (scoenye) - (2)
             GIG0, I guess.. - (Ashton)
             Thanks. Again. for your pithy al-punte summary. - (Ashton)

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