Not In This House. Not In This Lifetime.

Not exactly a glowing sales point

We can call it the "Telescreen". People will love it!

Yah, yelling back at the radio! That unit can also be configure to "listen" to you. Who da thunk. And on another note, many ppl carry a tracking device with them every were, and totally unaware of it, they call it a cell phone.
I just laffed a couple of days ago when I read that article and wondered when I'd see it in here. In that you can be (the capability has existed but not necessarily applied) monitored by your electronic devices has been known for decades:-)))

Big Brother is not only watching but listening to you? It may be smart tv but it's you'd have to be dumb to hook one up.

For most of the crap that's on TV it may be time to go back to rabbit ears...they don't listen.

Some things to remember.

First, if you don't have wireless in the house and do everything by Ethernet, -you- get to decide what phones home and what doesn't. No network access, no Telescreen. As well, if you do have wireless just make sure you don't enter the access code into the net-attached gizmo, it can't connect without that.

Second, there is nothing electronic built by the hand of Man that cannot be modified with a pair of wire cutters. If you don't want your new TV reporting back to Big Brother on you, learn where to snip.

Incidentally, there are plenty of Samsung and other "smart" TVs out there with cameras in them. "In Soviet Kanuckistan, TV watches you!" is no longer a joke, its a description. You find out where they put the camera and you stick a post-it on there. Also, if there's a microphone you want to disable but the machine breaks if you snip the wire, a bit of crazy glue on the mic's guts will make it cease functioning quite nicely. Or nail polish, or epoxy, or JB Weld, or anything like that.

The nice thing about the Internet is that there are all kinds of suspicious tinfoil hat wearing hackers out there who positively LIVE to brag that they figured out how to sabotage their Smart TV, or their car, or whatever. And they usually provide exquisitely detailed instructions on how to do it, so that you will know and appreciate how clever they were to figure it all out.

Third, you can hook any Smart TV up to a computer as a monitor with HDMI. In that way, the computer does all the interface with Netflix or Apple TV or whatever, all the TV does is sit there and be a monitor. Completely bypasses the "Smart" part, which is the part that phones home to Samsung. It can sit there and listen as hard as it wants, that info is never going to go anywhere.

Fourth, you can configure your router to specifically stop all packets going to or coming from any particular IP address. That's a bit of a pain to do, but if you want to use the Smart TV without it squealing on you all the time, you can block Samsung's servers without blocking the rest of the web.

Or you can make the TV surf pr0nz all day, 24/7/365, when you're not watching it. Disinformation is almost as good as no information.

You see this more and more. 'Smart' technology that is actually dumb when you start thinking it through.
http://driving.ca/infiniti/auto-news/news/heres-the-problem-with-push-button-ignitions

This sort of thing is not new. For a few years we have been offered an upgrade on our home security system. One where the security company can talk with you. they can hear what is going on in your home "in case of an emergency". WTHeck? What if someone is bored and just decides to listen in? Why would any right thinking person volunteer a listening device into their home???54gfnc

Samsung Big Brother works for Samsung and Obama and his fellow villians are sure to sign a contract with them

I have a vision of a guy snoring in front of his television while being monitored by another guy snoozing at work.

My dear late Grandma from Waldheim was ahead of her time. For years before she passed she would place a blanket over the tv set so people couldn't see into her house and listen in on conversations. I think the only time it came off is when 100 Huntley Street was on, or she was going to watch a Gaithers video.

I have a Samsung Smart TV and I love it. I guess I shouldn't have joked about my Grandma's many conspiracy theories.

By-Law they will obviously be voice "deactivated" on First Nations reserves and families belonging to the Religion of Peace..

My TV is a Vizio not a samsung and i,ve had it for a few years now

I won't buy anything from SONY, since they once installed rootkits on their DVD's that installed themselves on your home computer (without telling you, let alone without your permission) and sent info back to SONY.

Guess I'm not buying anything from Samsung, either.