LG smart TVs caught logging audio with screen off and snooping on local devices

LG smart TVs continuously sweep home networks, map secondary devices, and log microphone audio while appearing to be turned off, according to a new 135-minute video by Gamers Nexus and independent researchers. Testing of retail LG OLED models including the G5 showed the TVs scanning local networks for phones and smartwatches, gathering Wi-Fi names and signal strengths, and capturing clean microphone audio in standby mode, with data fed into LG Ad Solutions, which claims access to 363 million secondary addressable devices in the US. The researchers also documented remote code execution vulnerabilities in webOS and recommended disconnecting LG sets from the internet.

LG smart TVs caught logging audio with screen off and snooping on local devices LG smart TVs continuously sweep home networks, map secondary devices, and log microphone audio while appearing to be turned off, according to a new 135-minute-long video published by Gamers Nexus https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IFVTcM28KA see below . In more detail, Steve had been working with Level1Techs https://www.youtube.com/c/Level1Techs and independent security researchers. Together, they tested retail LG OLED models including the G5 LG-OLED-G5-and-wireless-M5-to-launch-with-brighter-panels-up-to-165-Hz-and-more-AI-features-than-ever-before.941456.0.html . Network packet captures taken through Wireshark https://www.wireshark.org/ showed the TVs actively scanning the local area network for unrelated hardware, including phones and smartwatches. Apart from internal IP addresses, the sets also gathered the names and signal strengths of neighboring Wi-Fi networks along with location data. This data collection pool is fed into into LG Ad Solutions https://lgads.tv/ the company’s targeted advertising arm . LG claims they have roughly 216 million smart TV sales globally. On the other hand, the ad division says it has access to 363 million secondary addressable devices in the US alone by tracking other hardware on the same network. The sets also run Automated Content Recognition ACR . It samples on-screen audio and video into digital fingerprints to log what users watch across inputs. While ACR has been well documented https://www.pocket-lint.com/how-to-stop-your-lg-tv-from-spying-on-you/ in the past, new testing shows the data collection goes much further than just that. During bench tests, they found the TV could capture clean microphone audio while the screen was or at least looked to be powered down in standby mode. When the team disconnected the TV from Ethernet, the set continued saving voice input locally and uploaded the stored files once network access was restored. The researchers also documented remote code execution vulnerabilities in webOS https://www.lg.com/us/webos?srsltid=AfmBOoplJDg3r5B9YzI8lUnUVAaOBrJGzNYQD8ceRyzM0jE0D3hiZsco that are currently moving through the responsible disclosure process. Because of the fact that the TV uses broad network listeners and data sweeps out of the box, the team's recommendation was straight-up disconnecting LG sets from the internet and using external streaming devices instead. LG has not commented on any of this as of writing.