Most smart TVs sold since 2015 keep a record of everything on the screen, on every input, and sell it to advertisers. Yours probably does. Checking takes ten seconds.
On the record
“In the fact that we have the glass. We own the glass. We own the TV.”
Speaking to an advertising audience. LG Ad Solutions is the LG-owned company that sells advertising built on what LG televisions collect.
“Because, you know, we own the glass, and we have first-party ACR data, automated content recognition data. We understand everything that hits the screen.”
“We know who's in the LG household. We know which devices are there. We know what you're exposed to on TV, and we know how to extend that reach into mobile.”
“Since we own the screen and we own the operating system.”
What happened when people looked
None of these people work for us. They are named, their words are theirs, and every one links to the second they said it.
“What happens when I'm taking a patient phone call, or I'm doing patient video visits, and there's an LG monitor in the background? How is that patient information protected?”
“I've never advised using the TV's built-in apps. It is a devil's deal, and eventually it will come to pass.”
Wendell ran the network captures and the firmware analysis in this investigation.
“Customers buying TVs costing thousands of dollars aren't just customers. They're also the product.”
“Selling a TV is a one-time sale. Selling data and advertisements and training AI continues indefinitely.”
“A one-time consent prompt buried in a TV app is not a substitute for meaningful transparency, ongoing control, and platform oversight.”
“I love giving up my seventh amendment rights to a company in an agreement that I never actually read.”
Said sarcastically, about the forced arbitration clause in the terms you accept on the remote.
“They do send one final snapshot of all tracking data to Alfonso upon opting out though, which is pretty dirty of them.”
From decompiling the firmware. We have not seen a packet capture of that upload, so treat it as reported rather than measured.
“Some of these TV companies are now making more margin dollars from targeted ads than they are from selling the actual TV hardware.”
Every line above is a public statement, quoted from the source and linked to the moment it was said. We use no one's photograph and we publish no testimonials we did not receive. Every claim we make, with its source.
Every clip here is the room as the TV's software sees it. The facts under each one come from the makers' own documentation and settlements, and they are on the TV page for each model.
Samsung's Tizen documents sampling the panel several times a second and uploading matches about once a minute. Live TV, streaming, HDMI inputs, all of it.
LG calls it Live Plus. Samsung calls it Viewing Information Services. Roku calls it Smart TV Experience. None of them say fingerprinting, and none of them are off when you unbox the set.
Vizio's Inscape unit built the business and paid a 2017 FTC settlement for doing it without consent. LG bought the ACR company Alphonso in 2021 and runs it as LG Ad Solutions. The data pays for the cheap TV.
Free app Coming to iOS and Android
Store links go live with the app. The lookup above works today and covers 8 TV platforms.
The Box Waitlist open
A small box that gives your TVs their own Wi-Fi network. It blocks the fingerprinting and ad traffic for every set in the house, leaves Netflix, YouTube and your inputs alone, and sends a monthly report of what it stopped. Works in apartments and on shared networks where you cannot touch the router.
Glassback
Monthly receipt September
Network Living room box
Fingerprint attempts blocked
41,206
Living room41,206
LG C series OLED · LG webOS · BLOCKED
Bedroom12,880
TCL Roku TV · Roku OS · BLOCKED
Kitchen0
Apple TV 4K · Apple tvOS · NOTHING TO BLOCK
Kept trying to reach alphonso.tv, lgsmartad.com, lgad.cjpowercast.com. Streaming apps untouched.
A toggle is a promise. A blocked request is a fact.