This brings back memories of JailbreakMe[0] with 'slide to jailbreak' in iOS 4. I am definitely starring and rooting my nice LG OLED that is currently an ad-filled cancer-fest.
They had an entire exploit chain from Safari to root. I can't imagine how much that would be worth today on the black market.
Is there a list of LG TVs this works on? If I buy an LG C1 today, will this allow me to root it?
You can join the OpenLGTV Discord for more information:
(check pinned messages in rootmytv channel)
It still boggles my mind that people connect these things to the Internet :p
Even if I don't connect the TV to the internet, I'll still be subjected to their rules. Who knows what this proprietary software is programmed to do? Maybe they wrote it so the TV will connect itself to the first available network it finds, with or without my consent. Maybe it's programmed to punish me for not giving them data by withholding features that don't require internet connection. This software is gonna do whatever is best for the corporation, my interests be damned.
I want software that does what I want without concern about some corporation's bottom line. Software I can trust.
Me too. Unfortunately, the bottom line is - if you didn't write it yourself, you can't trust it. That goes right down to the firmware/compiler level.
I would love to see open-source TV firmware. Or at the very least, some kind of certification that devices are not consumer-hostile.
For most of us, just blocking it from the internet is enough. If you're still worried, you could remove the antenna or wifi module, as some people are forced to with their cars now.
I think the only real solution to consumer-hostile devices is legislation, but that of course comes with it's own myriad problems.
Not particularly surprising, given that cable is dying and most content is delivered over the Internet nowadays. Sure, you can use something like an Apple TV, a Roku, or Fire TV, but most people prefer the convenience of a single device rather than having to buy a second device. In fact, LG TVs come preinstalled with almost all the streaming apps: Netflix, Disney+, Prime Video, HBO Max, YouTube, Hulu, Plex, etc etc.
People always choose convenience.
It's easy to assume that they'll eventually require an unabridged connection to their own servers for updates, and they will simply send all ad data through the same routes such that you can't block one without blocking the other.
This is too lucrative for manufacturers to pass up. The added complexity also ads more points of failure and drives faster industry-wide consumer upgrade cycles. This is not something that will be fixed in the market alone.
I give it 15 years or so for the tech to mature.
Ads will play at 3AM and the TV will just record.
Or push it through some kind of subcarrier data signal.
TV will be able to triangulate its location by multilateration of ATSC/DVB-T signals. West end of the city will play different ads than east end.
Not quite as bad as that, but since I took my Sony TV offline it regularly reboots itself (when "off") and sometimes needs a "hard" start via the physical power button as the remote on has become unresponsive. I strongly suspect that it's just badly coded, going mad trying to connect to resources that don't exist, filling logs, etc. then failing over.
I so want tracked advertising in all of its forms to be outlawed.
Well for convenience I'd rather use the built in netflix/hbo/etc apps than use a separate box with a separate remote on them.
Unfortunately those don't work without the Internets(tm).
Same thing on the Sony Bravia I have in my living room, which is what I usually watch television on.
But I do run my own DNS server in an OPNSense router/firewall with some pretty strict blocking rules, and it recurses to a NextDNS server that also has its own blocklists enabled. So if these devices are actually using DNS via DHCP instead of hard-coding their own servers, and serving ads from known ad domains, that would do it.
Not sure if LG hasn't got around to sourcing ads for the EU or they're not doing it because of some legal reasons.
Edit: got some screenshots. Apparently you need to agree to the terms and conditions to get ads on a RO LG. Don't know who ever does that.