Jump to content

Samsung TVs: Difference between revisions

From Consumer Rights Wiki
Bananabot (talk | contribs)
Added archive URLs for 1 citation(s) using CRWCitationBot
Bananabot (talk | contribs)
Added archive URLs for 1 citation(s) using CRWCitationBot
Line 11: Line 11:


== ACR user data collection ==
== ACR user data collection ==
Samsung, along with a number of other smart TV manufacturers, were sued by Texas Attorney General in December 2025 for failing to disclose the data collection capabilities of [[wikipedia:Automatic_content_recognition|ACR (Automatic Content Recognition)]] in their products.<ref name="petition-samsung">{{Cite web |date=December 15, 2025 |title=State of Texas v. Samsung Electronics America, Inc., Original Petition |url=https://texasattorneygeneral.gov/sites/default/files/images/press/Samsung%20TV%20Petition%20Filed.pdf |access-date=January 21, 2026 |publisher=Office of the Texas Attorney General |format=PDF |archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20260206163119/https://www.texasattorneygeneral.gov/sites/default/files/images/press/Samsung%20TV%20Petition%20Filed.pdf |archive-date=6 Feb 2026}}</ref> Under the lawsuits, it is alleged that Samsung utilized ACR technology to determine what the the viewer is watching and sell the data to advertisers without consent. Anecdotal evidence lends credence to these claims in the form of abnormal amounts of telemetry data being uploaded to Samsung's servers by their smart TVs.<ref>https://www.reddit.com/r/samsung/comments/1kpulqw/samsung_smart_tvs_privacy_nightmare_massive/</ref>  
Samsung, along with a number of other smart TV manufacturers, were sued by Texas Attorney General in December 2025 for failing to disclose the data collection capabilities of [[wikipedia:Automatic_content_recognition|ACR (Automatic Content Recognition)]] in their products.<ref name="petition-samsung">{{Cite web |date=December 15, 2025 |title=State of Texas v. Samsung Electronics America, Inc., Original Petition |url=https://texasattorneygeneral.gov/sites/default/files/images/press/Samsung%20TV%20Petition%20Filed.pdf |access-date=January 21, 2026 |publisher=Office of the Texas Attorney General |format=PDF |archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20260206163119/https://www.texasattorneygeneral.gov/sites/default/files/images/press/Samsung%20TV%20Petition%20Filed.pdf |archive-date=6 Feb 2026}}</ref> Under the lawsuits, it is alleged that Samsung utilized ACR technology to determine what the the viewer is watching and sell the data to advertisers without consent. Anecdotal evidence lends credence to these claims in the form of abnormal amounts of telemetry data being uploaded to Samsung's servers by their smart TVs.<ref>https://www.reddit.com/r/samsung/comments/1kpulqw/samsung_smart_tvs_privacy_nightmare_massive/ ([https://web.archive.org/web/20260224111819/https://old.reddit.com/r/samsung/comments/1kpulqw/samsung_smart_tvs_privacy_nightmare_massive/ Archived])</ref>  


More information about the lawsuits can be read [[Texas Attorney General sues multiple TV makers over ACR user data collection|here]].
More information about the lawsuits can be read [[Texas Attorney General sues multiple TV makers over ACR user data collection|here]].

Revision as of 11:18, 24 February 2026

🔧 Article status notice: This article may rely heavily on AI/LLMs

This article has been marked because it may have heavy use of LLM generated text that affects its perceived or actual reliability and credibility.


To contact a moderator for removal of this notice once the article's issues have been resolved, or if this was a mistake, please use either the Moderator's noticeboard, or the #appeals channel on our Discord server (Join using this link]).


Learn more ▼


⚠️ Article status notice: This article has been marked as incomplete

This article needs additional work for its sourcing and verifiability to meet the wiki's Content Guidelines and be in line with our Mission Statement for comprehensive coverage of consumer protection issues. In particular:

  1. No references

This notice will be removed once the issue/s highlighted above have been addressed and sufficient documentation has been added to establish the systemic nature of these issues. Once you believe the article is ready to have its notice removed, please visit the Moderator's noticeboard, or the discord and post to the #appeals channel.

Learn more ▼


Samsung smart TVs have been the subject of several controversies, namely due to data privacy concerns and misleading consumers.

Automatic manipulation of reviewer benchmarks

In 2022, TV reviewers found that their Samsung smart TVs were automatically detecting benchmark usage to manipulate the results.[1] Upon detection, the TVs would adjust their color and luminance tracking to appear more accurate than it is. Furthermore, the TV would also boost its peak brightness beyond the safe limits of the display to simulate having a higher peak brightness than it can provide under normal usage. This caused many reviewers to unknowingly publish incorrect, higher-scoring benchmark results for the affected TV models until evidence of these issues were made public.

Shortly after receiving backlash for this incident, Samsung pushed updates to the affected TVs to remove the benchmark detection behavior.

ACR user data collection

Samsung, along with a number of other smart TV manufacturers, were sued by Texas Attorney General in December 2025 for failing to disclose the data collection capabilities of ACR (Automatic Content Recognition) in their products.[2] Under the lawsuits, it is alleged that Samsung utilized ACR technology to determine what the the viewer is watching and sell the data to advertisers without consent. Anecdotal evidence lends credence to these claims in the form of abnormal amounts of telemetry data being uploaded to Samsung's servers by their smart TVs.[3]

More information about the lawsuits can be read here.

Voice recordings of private conversations

In February 2015, CNet first reported that the privacy policy of Samsung smart TVs reveals that they can record private conversations and send them to the manufacturer or its party contractors for voice recognition.[4]

At the time, this was a novel concept as smart speakers like Amazon Echo were just coming out, and the backlash prompted Samsung to release a statement that transmission of voice recordings was specifically limited to instances when the voice recognition feature is used and updated its privacy policy to be more specific in this regard. However, Samsung did not explicitly deny the fact that this could lead to private conversations being transmitted to Samsung or their partner Nuance, Inc.[5]

See also

Automatic content recognition

Texas Attorney General sues multiple TV makers over ACR user data collection

References

  1. Larsen, Rasmus (2022-06-03). "Samsung caught cheating in TV benchmarks, promises software update". FlatpanelsHD. Archived from the original on 28 Jan 2026. Retrieved 2026-02-09.
  2. "State of Texas v. Samsung Electronics America, Inc., Original Petition" (PDF). Office of the Texas Attorney General. December 15, 2025. Archived from the original (PDF) on 6 Feb 2026. Retrieved January 21, 2026.
  3. https://www.reddit.com/r/samsung/comments/1kpulqw/samsung_smart_tvs_privacy_nightmare_massive/ (Archived)
  4. Matyszczyk, Chris (2015-02-08). "Samsung's warning: Our Smart TVs record your living room chatter". CNET. Archived from the original on 15 Feb 2026. Retrieved 2025-08-30.
  5. "Samsung Smart TVs Do Not Monitor Living Room Conversations". Samsung Newsroom. 2015-02-10. Archived from the original on 3 Feb 2026. Retrieved 2025-08-30.