<
https://www.securityweek.com/smart-tv-surveillance-how-samsung-and-lgs-acr-technology-tracks-what-you-watch/>
"
Smart TVs from major manufacturers like Samsung and LG use a Shazam-like
tracking technology called Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) to monitor what
you watch — and opting out can be a painful process for end users.
According to a new study from researchers at the University College London,
University of California, Davis, and Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, the
tracker operates even when Smart TVs are used as ‘dumb’ external displays via
HDMI, potentially capturing content from gaming consoles or laptops.
The ACR technology, which has roots in the popular Shazam song-identification
tool, is designed to profile viewing activity of users, periodically capturing
the content displayed on a TV’s screen and matching it against a content
library to detect what content is being displayed at any given point in time.
This type of so-called “second party tracking” is directly integrated into the
Smart TV’s operating system, the researchers explained, noting that a black-box
audit of ACR network traffic between ACR clients on the smart TV and ACR
servers found a major difference in how the technology works across the US and
the UK.
In the US, the researchers found that ACR is active during free ad-supported
streaming TV (FAST) viewing, while in the UK it is turned off. This suggests
the default behavious is influenced by jurisdictional regulations and data
privacy laws.
The research team found that opting out of tracking features does appear to
stop ACR-related network traffic, suggesting privacy controls are effective but
notes that user-login status on Smart TVs does not impact ACR tracking
behavior."
Via Violet Blue’s
Cybersecurity Roundup: October 8, 2024
https://www.patreon.com/posts/cybersecurity-8-113584140
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
