Samsung and Vizio TVs still send ACR-like traffic after opt-out
Original title: Samsung and Vizio Smart TVs Still Send Tracking-Like Traffic After Users Turn It Off
A 12-TV study found Samsung and Vizio kept ACR-pattern traffic after opt-out, while an open server held over 57 million detection results.
The Watching the Watchers study tested 12 commercial televisions from ten manufacturers, about 95% of the U.S. smart TV market, across 5,943 automated experiments. Samsung Tizen and Vizio SmartCast kept sending traffic consistent with automatic content recognition after researchers disabled the feature. Most of that traffic was encrypted, so the study could not show what was stored. VIDAA sent ACR data unencrypted, and an unauthenticated server exposed more than 57 million detection results tied to over one million televisions.
Unconfirmed: Encrypted traffic means researchers could not confirm payloads or whether viewing histories were stored; results cover only tested devices and firmware.
- Samsung’s built-in streaming service showed ACR-like traffic in all 30 opted-out tests.
- Vizio contacted its Amazon Kinesis ACR endpoint in every opted-out run, with no drop.
- Opt-outs stopped ACR traffic on tested LG webOS, Sony Google TV, Amazon Fire TV, and VIDAA.
- VIDAA later required login, but MQTT ACR messages stayed unencrypted.
- Vizio WatchFree+ put program or channel names in DNS and TLS server names.
Impact: Possible ongoing viewing signals; millions of detection results exposed
| Product | Affected |
|---|---|
| Samsung Tizen television | — |
| Vizio SmartCast television | — |
| VIDAA | — |
- 1.Disconnect the TV from the internet or block the published ACR endpoints.
- 2.Note the blocklist does not stop the WatchFree+ title leak.
- Products
- TizenSmartCastVIDAAWatchFree+
- Countries
- United States
From the original article
3 min read at cybersecuritynews.com
Samsung and Vizio smart TVs kept sending traffic consistent with automatic content recognition (ACR) even after researchers turned off the feature in the privacy settings. The findings raise questions about whether smart TV privacy controls stop viewing-related data flows, while also clarifying an important limit. Encrypted traffic prevented researchers from confirming exactly what these devices […]
By Abinaya · cybersecuritynews.com
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