- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
- android@lemdro.id
- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
- android@lemdro.id
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Worth pointing out this isn’t any proper Android TV devices, but rather those cheap boxes that are often basically SBCs with AOSP installed on them which are predominantly sold as easy piracy boxes.
Edit: in fact, the article doesn’t currently have TV in the title
Leaving out the TV makes it less precise and more clickbaity because then it sounds like Android phones are affected.
I guess the problem is that “Android TV” is a specific thing that none of these devices actually are, they’re just dodgy boxes running Android that can be plugged into a TV.
For me it’s more clickbaity because Android TV isn’t actually involved here at all.
I’d say it would be more clickbaity if you just removed the “TV”, because it’d make you think of smartphones, and those would be much more concerning
Yeah I’m not sure what the correct headline is, but at least for me I definitely clicked because I thought it was to do with Android TV, which it wasn’t. It was about those cheap boxes that anyone reading Ars already knows are probably filled with malware
Aren’t the boxes running “Android TV”, the set top box oriented flavor of Android, with e.g. the launcher designed to be operated with a TV remote and not a touch screen?
They are not themselves TVs, though, and I guess nowdays it might be most common for “Android TV” to run on the TV instead of on a separate device.
That’s the problem, they’re not running Android TV at all. Just regular phone Android with some third party launcher.
Are you sure? One can definitely build images of the actual “Android TV” for various SBCs and the sorts of SOCs in these TV boxes, and then load them up with malware. Why wouldn’t they use that?
Honestly, I’m not entirely sure why, but for whatever reason these boxes are always running a pretty old version of regular Android. (Edit: in fact googling a couple of the devices in the article seems to confirm that)
Maybe there are more protections preventing this kind of malware on newer versions? Maybe someone just made the images a long time ago and people are just reusing them
Those boxes are in a skin for normal Android to make it work with the TV. The only device you likely come in contact with with Android TV is the new Chromecast or a Sony TV. Other than the Nvidia shield and the Chromecast most actual Android TV devices still come with malware from the manufacturer. Even the Sony TVs, but basically every Smart TV comes with malware to spy on what you’re doing too.
I think the new dish network’s at top box also runs Android TV, maybe you found one of those wild.
Why not just find a different website reporting the story with a better headline? Rather than sharing the one with the headline you fear is misleading?
It’s only slightly misleading and Arstechnica writes really good articles. It’s pretty much the only news site I regularly browse.
Is there a better article to find?
Can you even get an actual Android TV device now that isn’t a Chromecast or an Nvidia shield? Other than a few TVs that mostly come with malware (tcl, Sony, Hisense) I can’t think of anything else that has actual Android TV you can buy as a consumer.
Xiaomi makes one, also Walmart carries one called Onn.
I miss having a dumb tv
If I don’t connect it to the internet they don’t get to sell ur data innit
I only watch pirated content. What data are they selling?
Your viewing habits. Nature shows? Show this guy camping gear ads on his phone!
You know, if I did get relevant ads from all of these places that are supposedly tracking everything that I do and monitoring my likes, I wouldn’t mind ads so much. But the fact that even though Google, for example, knows everything that I do and everywhere that I go and everything that I like, they still serve me irrelevant ads that I would never care about in a billion years. All of this touted targeted ads bullshit technology and it doesn’t even work. So I don’t care, harvest everything that I like and everything that I do. Because it doesn’t work anyway.
Bro being a regular sucks and it even sucks more when you don’t know what you’re taking about. They will sell you Nike while making you think that you’re life sucks because you’re fat.
Ah well goodluck google. I haven’t seen a single ad from past 6-7 years. Next DNS on my router, Linux mint with Firefox (ublock origin) and same for android.
Nice! I do pretty much the same except for the dns part. I’ll look into it.
Having said that, I’ve always said that we should be able to purchase dumb TVs, and when people say “just don’t connect it to the net,” they’re missing the point, because they’re still enabling these companies (this is not directed at you specifically. It’s just an argument I keep hearing.)
Shit will want to connect some way. If I ever have to buy a smart TV for myself, I’m opening it up and swapping the brain board or removing the antenna.
I’m annoyed that they don’t sell them and that even if you don’t connect a smart tv to wifi to keep it dumb it’ll still not just be a display and it’ll try to shove stuff in your face
Most TVs have an office or presentation mode hidden somewhere in the settings, that will get rid of the ad-ridden interface and replace it with a plain and functional one. That plus no wifi, ever, gets them sorted.
I bought a Hisense and it had the option during setup to disable most smart features and leave it in “basic mode”. I was already going to put an Apple TV in it so I just left it there and I’ve been happy. Only thing a tv needs is settings and the ability to change inputs.
android tv has this option at setup, like Sony and whatever else
your Hisense has android tv pre-installed
LOL I’m still using an old CRT TV because it just won’t die and I barely watch TV
Walmart sells Sceptre 4k tvs which are dumb, sure they aren’t OLED or have amazing refresh rates but they are the perfect TV for most people, it’s much easier to chuck and buy a new $20 streaming device when updates make it crawl to a near stop than it is to do the same with a $600+ TV.
These new Led backlit tvs die like every 2 years and need led strip replacement. I had to repair mine 3 times now while my old lcd tv never died in 15+ years and I gave it to my dad who is using it for past 8 years daily.
Any Smart TV can be a dumb TV if not connected to the internet
And what you will do with the preinstalled malware and bloatware?
Whats the malware going to do?
Lock you out? Instant refund and negative review. Steal your info? Cant send info out without internet.
But it will still be a bloat and take up resources like any deamon/service and resources are already very low on these devices!
Not connecting to internet is not a solution but buying dump TV is.
I gave mine up when I had to move cross country. I miss it dearly.
That’s why you should build your own media center from an old machine. Much safer and more private.
The problem is that YouTube app and F1 app are Android only so having a Linux media box won’t help. It needs to run Android to run Android apps.
Plus I like to use Chromecast, we use it all the time to send YouTube videos from our phones to the big screen.
What’s wrong with using YouTube in a browser?
Can’t control it from my phone. Would need a mouse. At least I’m tech minded. My wife isn’t and there is no way she would stand for using a mouse and browser on the TV.
Ah, right, makes sense. I’m using a steam controller (or any other controller with steam, honestly) instead of a mouse, which works well enough
I don’t know about apps like F1 and Chromecast, but I can see that it could be a problem. But YouTube has worked fine for me with the MPV player. Maybe you could try Android-x86? (is that thing still alive? 😅)
I swear shit like this is why Lemmy is so incredibly out of touch with the real world. I can’t take the community seriously anymore.
So my home media center is not real world enough? I only expressed an opinion; you are free to ignore it. Also, there is nothing that keeps you here. Please kindly keep in mind that most Lemmy users right now are interested in technology, you can’t take that away from them and there is nothing wrong with it. If you want to stay away from “shit like this”, then, with all respect, you probably should not be in a technology sub in the first place.
I think the difference is folks confuse the general public with the general lemmy user. And I can’t tell if the fediverse and lemmy are supposed to be attempting to be a front page for general folks or lemmy early adopter folks.
I agree. Too many comments and threads are hijacked or over represented by the pro piracy crowd. I wish more communities would just ban the shit post of “yar, time to sail the high seas” that seem to be the top comment on any media related post.
You’re going to build your own smart TV that can handle new HDMI and Displayport advancements too?
This is going to come as a shock to you, but HDMI has been a thing since 2004. You can find 15 year old dumb TVs with HDMI. If the TV had HDMI, it can handle any format that the screen can physically show and newer versions are backwards compatible.
Or you could just use a new tv with smart features and never connect it to your network. It’s what I’ve done with all the TVs in my house and I simply use an external device I trust to stream.
This is going to be such a nightmare as smart devices become the majority.
Didn’t connect your TV to the Internet? Don’t worry, it’ll spy on you by connecting to the neighbor’s tv. Or the built-in WiFi in the modem. Or the power company’s smart meter via powerline-networking.
Products are going to be engineered to sell backdoor access at a hefty price, if they aren’t already.
Things are going to get scary.
Just like anything with technology though, there will be people in the other side too. Does that magic TV with a mind of it’s own have a USB port? If they take away the USB , they will have to add some way to maintenance it. There will always be a way to get at the kernel if you know what you’re doing.
It’s going to become this horrible game of cat and mouse, for anyone who actually values privacy.
Sure, you could open the device up, remove any antennas. You could add powerline filtering. You could find the jtag or debug ports. You could find a way to hack it. Jam a signal. Make an ultrasonic white noise machine. Wrap the thing in foil. Cover the cameras.
The individual has to block every channel of “attack”. The data miners only need to get lucky once.
Newer “smart” sets, particularly from Vizio and a couple other brands, will not let you exit the setup or use the inputs without an internet connection
Wow, I would immediately return any TV that pulled that bs. I have used Sony TV’s for a very long time and have never encountered this issue, I even bought a new one in summer 2022 and it did not require Internet connection to function.
LTT reviewed a Roku one like that recently and for some reason didn’t recommend immediately binning it.
Pff sure. How hard can it be? Few resistor thingies and some capaci-whatsists, and Arduino, done.
The correct answer is usually Raspberry pi + github.
Although I have no idea what those mean
You can easily configure those with block-chain based AI.
Don’t forget to setup the transistor receptors!
The flux capacitor comes first tho
Almost any ARM SBC and a dumb TV will do, install linux/a minimal wayland compositor and waydroid and youre laughing
Any time there’s a advancement you just update the board, instead of the whole TV (which its not like normal smart TV’s update their ports anyways?)
Wait, smart devices might not be secure?! I’m shocked!
Are non smart TVs even still a thing nowadays? I don’t own or watch any TV so I honestly don’t know how the market currently looks like.
Yes. They are sold for commercial use, e.g., McD’s menu, and are quite pricey.
I think you meant to say not subsidized by ad tracking lol
Yes, not subsidized…and therefore pricy.
Depends on your definition of “quite pricey.” There’s no equivalent of a $250 50" Insignia FireTV, but I’ve seen Samsung signage displays on Amazon for about a $75-$100 premium over their comparable Smart TVs. They also don’t come with a stand, so if you weren’t already buying a VESA mount you’ll need to add another $40-80. There is a significant premium, but it’s not necessarily orders of magnitude.
And they’re made better… To be on 24x7. So you’re also paying for a better quality display. That’s worth paying for too.
Apparently “smartness” has not invaded projectors…per a comment I read here on kbin a while back from a projector owner. This really encourages me to buy one.
It did though, last time I went to a tech store, there was a samsung smart projector that had all the capabilities of a smart tv
I hope it is not ubiquitous.
Not yet, but it is definitely heading that direction
Although a projector would need you to have a home with a whole spare wall. And would force you to dim the lights all the time.
They’re harder to find, for sure. Especially if you want a large screen.
When I was shopping around a few years ago, the only 65" TV I could find without smart features was a Sceptre, which is Walmart’s electronics brand. Speakers so bad that I had to buy a sound bar, and the display isn’t that great, but it gets the job done and I don’t need to worry about it being an attack vector.
They get called “monitors” a lot (depending whether you need them to pick up cable/airwaves of course)
Not really but you can always get a “smart” tv and never connect it to the Internet. If you want to stream just use an external device you trust like a PC
Yepp - hop on Ebay or some surplus auction site, and search for commercial/signage displays. Don’t bother buying new unless you have the money for it IMO, they are expensive unless you get them used
Edit: typo
China hacked my fucking coffee mug.
These are just generic Android TV devices that use Allwinner board. Allwinner made these kind of generic boards for Android TV and Android Auto head unit and sell them to OEMs. The OEMs then “customize” it by adding their APKs into the ROM provided by Allwinner. I doubt the malware come from Allwinner. Maybe it’s just one (or more) OEM that include whatever APK they found on the internet without checking.
Owning a smart TV is one of the stupidest things you can do.
I’m admittedly this type of stupid, but I also know how to blacklist all the domains my garbage ass Vizio tries to phone home to.
They make the devices cheap so that they can spy on you. It’s the New Deal.
Edit: I see i’m not the only one who gave up on finding a reasonable TV and just opted to neuter a Smart TV instead. Now that I’m not in a position of “me want now, nothing in local store”, I think Ill take a few moments to do some research for everyone, and myself, just to highlight that there actually are still options. Heres a few brands I found that still offer Dumb TVs. I know nothing else about these, and am not in any way promoting these brands or claiming they are good at all. IDK.
This is not endorsement
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Sceptre, breaks “Smart TVs” out as separate “android TVs” group, From “4K UHD” and “LED” offerings: https://www.sceptre.com/
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Supersonic, breaks out “smart TVs” from "4k " and “HD/FHD” TVs: https://www.supersonicinc.com/
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Caixun, breaks out “Linux” and “Android” TVs, from “4k” and HD" TVs: https://www.caixun-global.com/
If anyone has relevant info about these brands, related to if they are good or suck… let me know.
Do modern TVs even come in non-smart variants anymore?
yeah I have 3 connected to this PC
Edit, i felt bad about being a smart ass, and edited my parent comment to be more… helpful
But they’re expensive.
A 50" TV is about $220. (smart TV)
A 50" monitor is $650.
Yep. Thus why i edited my comment in an attempt to back-wheel a little.
Monitors are more expensive because of:
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Monitors generally higher refresh rates (images displayed per time interval) with Monitors being from 60-240Hz, and TVs generally only being 60-120Hz (Hz = number per second)
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Monitors typically have calibrated/better color accuracy and white balance versus TVs
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Monitors have ~141PPI, TVs ~86PPI (Pixels Per Inch: Measurement of pixel density). A 24" monitor is basically the same thing as a 40" TV where pixel density is concerned.
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Monitors generally have much better response time (how fast a pixel can change colors) with Monitors being ~5 milliseconds, and TVs being ~16 milliseconds.
The additional hardware requirements to meet the higher specs necessarily drives up the cost of computer monitors, when compared to TVs. Sorry.
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It doesn’t really matter, just don’t connect them to the internet. Our TV just has a 14 year old computer that plays media perfectly, and is completely cut off from the internet.
If they allow you to do that without any loss in functionality.
It takes some research if youve never done anything like it before, but you can drip feed it the internet via a pihole, and starve it specifically of ads and data collection. Keep the functionality, kill the leech.
Google smart tv pihole, theres a few guides, for anyone interested.
But why? It doesn’t need that for anything. Just plug an old computer in via HDMI and bookmark movie-web.app or download/stream stuff from anywhere. Much better quality, interface, and no jank.
Just depends on what you need it for, and what youre trying to plug into it.
For example, some people dont have spare computers to turn into a mini server, but do have $60 and the time to fiddle with a raspberry pi.
Mines a 14 year old gateway you could prolly get for free or under 100, much more powerful than a RPi. Using Windows 10 on it with zero issue.
I do have a couple Pis next to it but those don’t hook up to any screens, I just tunnel into em. One is a PiHole and one is a server. :3
Curious, what functionality would I lose? All it needs to do is turn on and display video through an HDMI port.
Samsung historically has had a habit of poaching features from their Smart TVs as they age, eventually leaving you with a not so smart TV after a decade or so. Not sure if other manufacturers do the same
Aha! Yeah that’s okay with me, since we just disable their internet hook computers up, to use them as dumb monitors.
What a realistic approach! A thing getting dumber as it ages, what a great idea!
/s
no.
It’s hard to buy a dumb TV now
its called a monitor
Edit, i felt bad about being a smart ass, and edited my parent comment to be more… helpful
Above 35" monitors aren’t that common, and the ones that exist are basically TVs with TV software.
Commercial displays are the only real alternative. Some of them even come with a slot for a Raspberry Pi compute module.
I heard Sceptre still sells them. Never bought one so can’t vouch for quality
new Moto G phones come to mind lol
just got one and dear lord so much adware
Admittedly I haven’t been looking that hard, but I don’t think I’ve seen a TV for sale in the past 10 years that wasn’t a “smart” TV.
I’ve updated my comment with some info, Hope it helps next time you’re in the market.
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In total the researchers confirmed eight devices with backdoors installed—seven TV boxes, the T95, T95Z, T95MAX, X88, Q9, X12PLUS, and MXQ Pro 5G, and a tablet J5-W.
The other thing discussed is fraudulent android apps that have been removed from the play store.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
This week, cybersecurity firm Human Security is revealing new details about the scope of the infected devices and the hidden, interconnected web of fraud schemes linked to the streaming boxes.
“They’re like a Swiss Army knife of doing bad things on the Internet,” says Gavin Reid, the CISO at Human Security who leads the company’s Satori Threat Intelligence and Research team.
“This is a truly distributed way of doing fraud.” Reid says the company has shared details of facilities where the devices may have been manufactured with law enforcement agencies.
In the second half of 2022, Human Security says in its report, its researchers spotted an Android app that appeared to be linked to inauthentic traffic and connected to the domain flyermobi.com.
When Milisic posted his initial findings about the T95 Android box in January, the research also pointed to the flyermobi domain.
The company’s report, which has data scientist Marion Habiby as its lead author, says Human Security spotted at least 74,000 Android devices showing signs of a Badbox infection around the world—including some in schools across the US.
The original article contains 455 words, the summary contains 180 words. Saved 60%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
My OctoPrint server runs on one of these (previous homeowners left it lying around), but I completely nuked Android and installed the Armbian distro for the Inovato Quadra (itself just a carefully sourced and rebranded TV box). It was tedious though, and I’d never buy one for that purpose when there are dedicated SBCs.
Personal opinion: if you’ve got a decent pi kicking around, it makes a better media server than any smart TV ever has. Bonus points for running pihole.
4k though
I’m simple, I know. Idc if I get 2k or 4k. Never even owned a 4k TV. I see no need.
Ok but for the rest of us it means that it’s categorically NOT better than any Smart TV…
That is an active choice you can change, or you can accept that better things are more expensive.
I rememberLinus Tech Tips talking about that month ago:
Do you have a credible source instead?
Lmfao
Woah, I just checked, and apparently they are back to releasing videos.
Still more credible than 90% of random tech outlets.
3/10 is still not a good rating, even if strictly better than 2/10
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://piped.video/1vpepaQ-VQQ?si=t52OHvJ79nnXSsYC
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Good bot
Isn’t his gf/wife Chinese ?
Definitely not unkillable tho
installing your own OS and/or bootloader is a pain and most of the time unfeasable. And that’s the only way to safely kill software based backdoors.
Even then, unless you also blow away the firmware, you can’t be sure it’s clean.
on Android, the OS is the firmware. If you talk about peripheral firmware, I’d not call it “software based” anymore.
Where are the hackers when you need them?
Looks like my old bravia and rpi is a good combination.
Chinesium devices, anyone?
You have a device not made in China?
I have a tv built in 1978, it was made somewhere in Michigan dont know where the sticker is faded in that part.
Cool. 500W worth of lamps for (maybe) 32" of terrible quality picture?
Its actaully widescreen and the picture quality is surprisingly decent.
Except that old CRT cannot display modern digital images.
Yeah, I was making a joke. Do love that bastard though, also its fun to daisy chain adapters and run firesticks and shit on it. Good for old movies and games that were intended for CRT.
I tried to make that shit work with Raspberry pi. All attempts were futile.
Here it is: https://discuss.tchncs.de/post/2626604
Its called google and it infects all stock android devices
Anyway I actually have one of those devices. It was support to be a birthday present but it came with some baggage. By the time I realized it I couldn’t return it
