Kamal Ghorui
Your smart TV is a mole. As TOI reported yesterday, it collects snapshots of everything you watch and hear, and sends them to ‘data brokers’, so that they can refine your profile, and sell it to advertisers. Are we surprised? Yes, although we shouldn’t be, knowing that our phones – and the apps on them – tablets and laptops are all part of the ‘surveillance economy’. Smart ACs, those with voice command functions, can be easily hacked to listen in on bedroom talk. Smart cars keep a GPS log of every place you’ve been to. Why should smart TVs be less devious?
More than surprise, there’s a sense of betrayal. We weren’t told that, while bingeing on shows, we’d never be alone in the room. That once every 500 milliseconds – 7,200 times an hour – our TV would relay info about shows and ads we’ve sat through. And for what? That’s the easier answer. Your family’s old ‘idiot box’ TV was a one-time purchase. The manufacturer didn’t earn a paisa from you after the sale. But by sharing your viewing habits, and tastes, with advertisers daily, your smart TV becomes a perpetual revenue stream.
As Bill Baxter, TV maker Vizio’s former CTO, said in 2019, this kind of spying – automatic content recognition or ACR – is the reason those 65-inch TVs have become so cheap. Manufacturers don’t need to recover their costs upfront. Last year, the global market for ACR data was worth $4.2bn. By 2034, it’s expected to touch $23bn – an yearly growth of 21%.
Should we be grateful for ACR then, view it as a subsidy? No. Firstly, because there’s no subsidy. You actually pay more overall – a lump sum first, followed by a pay-with-your-privacy model. Secondly, ACR is a secret clause. It’s not disclosed to you at the time of sale. Wouldn’t you pay more for a TV that didn’t track you? Cheaper hardware is no justification for invasion of privacy. Just as a discount doesn’t entitle a hotel to install cameras in its bathrooms. Plus, this kind of profiling is risky when the data flows to foreign servers, and possibly govts.
Viewing habits can reveal political leanings, and expose you to targeted online influence. That’s why it’s important to curb ACR use. It shouldn’t be turned on by default, and users should have an easy way to turn it off, even if they clicked ‘yes’ at some point.
END OF ARTICLE
