Is your smart home spying on you? The answer to this is pretty obvious. Of course, it does.
There are several smart devices which we install to make our homes look modern. This includes a basic smart thermostat to a hyper-modern smart TV. These devices listen and keep a note of our choices.
They suggest better options based on the choices we’ve made before. Almost every smart gadget you install will record data about you.
Are there any means to stop this from happening? Continue reading the article to understand the situation that you are in.
When you watch TV, it is watching you back
There are official reports from the FBI stating that your TV might be listening to you. People often tend to overlook this.
All of our smart TVs have direct connections to the internet. This makes it easier for them to transmit our data. When we purchase a smart TV we can notice that it contrasts a normal TV.
A normal TV would allow us to perform various changes using the settings option. But smart TVs only have a few options to play with.
Apart from changing the colour settings and a few more trivial features, there isn’t much you can change. There is another popular feature which smart TVs have.
Automatic Content Recognition is how the industry calls it. It constantly tracks your internet usage which includes the type of content you watch.
It analyzes it to provide you with suggestions for the shows you might like. This is also used to display personalized ads based on your interest.
If you do not want your TV listening to you all the time, you can disable this. The procedure is not common for all TVs.
But you can find these settings inside the general or advanced setting. Once you get to it, keep your eye open for options like “Viewing information”.
This should prevent your TV from listening to you. It will also disable the recommendations but there is no guarantee. But will this stop your smart home spying on you completely? No.
Are Smart Speakers a serious threat?
The majority of the accusations about the smart home spying on people are due to the use of smart speakers.
Smart Speakers like Echo from Amazon are ruling the industry. But isn’t it obvious why people call them “smart” speakers?
Smart Speakers like Echo also serve as digital assistants. How do they do it? They keep listening to you all the time awaiting instructions from you.
There have been several studies which say that 59% of the smart speaker users felt insecure. They have expressed their concerns about the unnecessary hearing and collection of data all the time.
They might seem like a fancy accessory. But do you think it is worth the risk? The choice is yours. There are certain ways in which you can minimize the risk.
Consider the situation where you ask your Google assistant to browse something for you. After you get your answer, you can ask the assistant to delete what you just asked.
This prevents other people from knowing your personal conversations. But there is a catch to this.
You have to be the account holder for your voice to match with the owner’s voice. Or the account holder has to enable “delete by voice” option in his settings.
Is your home security system really secure?
To promote the proper working of your surveillance system, it must be connected to the internet. This brings another question to the table.
If it is available on the internet can other people hack it? Yes, they can. If they do so, they can know every information about your home through the installed video cameras.
There are various privacy options to choose from. It still won’t stop your smart home spying on you. Once the information gets stored on the internet, it is vulnerable to theft.
Let’s throw some light on the Smart Build
It might seem trivial, but smart bulbs are a major reason behind smart home spying.
Security experts found a major loophole in the Philips Hue Smart Bulb. This small loophole might help a hacker to hack into your home’s computer network.
We do not have to get too technical on this. To put it in simple terms, it has something to do with the low power protocols.
Before the users came to know about this, Philips fixed this issue by giving a new firmware update.
To Conclude
We do not have to starve ourselves from using smart devices. But it is essential to know the security concerns which follow.
If you are not careful, all your personal data might end up on the internet. I hope this article was helpful and gave you some tips on how to stay careful.
Smart home spying is very real. Always make sure if these devices are worth the risk before buying them.
