What data your smart TV actually collects
· 2 min read
This is not a theory: it is described in the manufacturers' own privacy policies. The problem is that nobody reads them, and that the acceptance checkbox appears during initial setup, when all you want is to watch television.
What is collected
What you are watching. The most valuable item and the most collected. It includes what comes in over HDMI: what you play from a console, a laptop or an external player.
When and for how long. Usage times, session length, which days.
Which apps you open and for how long.
Device identifiers. Model, serial number, MAC address, advertising ID.
Your network. IP address, and with it an approximate location.
What you interact with. Which recommendations you click, which ads you see.
Who receives it
- The television manufacturer.
- The platform provider, which on Android TV is Google.
- Audience measurement partners, which is an entire industry.
- Advertising networks.
The part that surprises people: ACR
Automatic content recognition (ACR) samples what appears on screen and compares it against a fingerprint to identify the content. It works with broadcast television, with streaming, and with whatever arrives over HDMI.
Meaning: a television with ACR active can know which film you are watching from a laptop connected by cable. We give it a whole article.
What can be reduced
From the settings. Every manufacturer has privacy options. They are buried and switching them off genuinely helps. Look for "Advertising", "Product improvement", "Usage and diagnostics", "Viewing information".
By removing the telemetry services. That is what we document here, and it is the most complete route available without modifying firmware.
By filtering at the network level. Blocking telemetry domains at the DNS works on any television, including the ones that are not Android.
What to be clear about
Reducing is not eliminating. A television connected to the internet will always communicate something, and the only way to guarantee it sends nothing is not to connect it. That is a perfectly valid option too, and a fair number of people end up there.