Smart TVs have long been in controversial waters as far as privacy goes. From claims that your TV is a “privacy nightmare” to accusations of some models being a “mass surveillance system”, you probably haven't failed to notice the periodic storms that have erupted around what televisions get up to in terms of data and telemetry. The latest lightning strike that hit last week was a development around LG TVs (and PC monitors) whereby voice features (and a McAfee pop-up ad in Windows) came under fire.
LG has defended its position in no uncertain terms, it should be noted (although the mentioned Windows 11 pop-up has since been retracted). But regardless of the rights or wrongs here, this affair was enough of a reminder to prompt me to finally take action on something I've been meaning to do for quite some time anyway.
Namely, to take my smart TV offline, once and for all. This means I can ensure that I know for certain that my television isn't get up to any online ‘shenanigans' with whatever data may (or may not) be getting sent here or there — because it isn't online at all. And I don't need it to be online, either.
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Maybe this is something you'd like to do, as well, so if you're thinking of following in my footsteps, I'm going to break down everything for you. That includes whether you actually need to have your smart TV online, and how to go about disconnecting it from the internet while still installing updates for the television manually, should you wish, which is possible in many — but not all — cases.
Do you really need to have your smart TV online?
I'd argue that you don't need to have your smart TV online, although that said, answering this question isn't exactly straightforward and there are caveats depending on your personal situation.
Obviously, if you use the TV maker's smart hub for any of your viewing needs, and the apps therein for…