There’s been a lot of articles recently about those cheapo boxes being filled with spyware straight out the factory. Might wanna check that out.
Comment on After luring customers with low prices, Amazon stuffs Fire TVs with ads
Aceticon@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I have a nearly-dumb TV (chosen for that and never connected to the Internet) and a separate little Android TV box I got from AliExpress for 25 bucks were I only use Kodi.
The TV is maybe 4 years old, the little box maybe 1 year (I had a 10 year old similar thing before but it can’t handle newer video formats so I switched).
Have yet to see a single Ad.
Mind you my setup is as is because I’ve long ago learned that you want your fast-changing-cheap-tech bits separate from your expensive-long-life stuff, so in this case I want my digital video file decoding hardware separate from the much more expensive large digital TV screen.
killeronthecorner@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Aceticon@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I did.
It’s not on the list.
LWD@lemm.ee 1 year ago
[deleted]n3mo@programming.dev 1 year ago
Not sure why you’re being downvoted. But you’re correct—some TVs have been found to automatically connect to open wifi networks to phone home.
QuinceDaPence@kbin.social 1 year ago
Yeah. I have a Vizio smart TV but each time you turn it on it acts 100% like a dumb tv until you press the smart button.
I have a seperate shitty little HTPC that's used for all the media and my brother uses his xbox.
Evilcoleslaw@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Yeah, so you may not be seeing ads, but there’s a non-zero chance you have a botnet infested device on your network instead.
squidspinachfootball@lemm.ee 1 year ago
Is there a way to check if the little Android box you already have is one of these infected devices?
Evilcoleslaw@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Here’s the GitHub repo of a software developer that was one of the first to find this, and I think the first to make it really public. It has some info on how to tell and possible steps to do some cleanup.
github.com/DesktopECHO/T95-H616-Malware