I know Smart TV privacy concerns are a big conversation here, largely because there’s practically no good way to jailbreak a Smart TV, but I wanted to ask about a specific use case.
How much better is it to disable all network connectivity on a smart tv (running Roku as its core OS) and hook an Apple TV box up to it?
More or less, I suppose what I’m asking is whether or not using an Apple TV is as private as it can get with easy-to-use streaming devices?
This is what I’ve been doing for years - since the Apple TV came out, actually. I detest “smart” TVs, but the world has decided that’s my only option now. The first thing I do with a new Tv (I actually just upgraded mine recently) is disable the internet and turn off absolutely everything I can in whatever shit OS they are using. I plug in the Apple TV, set the input to that, and that’s it. It just works™️
I’m very concerned about privacy issues generally but am pretty comfortable with Apple’s stated and perceived privacy. If you’re paying for quality hardware and services through them, they have little incentive to sell you out – unlike pretty much every other tech company out there (I’m looking at you, Google).
The Apple TV is wicked fast (faster than any other TV OS or box I’ve ever seen) and has absolutely zero ads, zero cruft, and requires zero maintenance. If you are at all in the Apple universe with other devices, it’s perfectly seamless and tough to beat. I highly recommend it.
I know a bunch of Android/linux/Windows/Whatever-heads are gonna jump in and list a bunch of features or customizations the Apple to doesn’t have or can’t do… ya, that may be true but if that’s important to you… then don’t fucking buy it. Not everyone has the same use case as you. When I want to watch TV, I wanna watch TV – not update my Linux distro or whatever else I’ve hodge-podged together. I’ve built my own HTPCs and PVRs and, frankly, know this stuff inside-out. For me, and probably millions of others, nothing comes close to the Apple TV in terms of price, time commitment, simplicity, functionality AND privacy.
AppleTV is smooth but as others pointed out you shouldn’t trust their claims that they’re private. They’re probably more private than e.g. Google out of the box, but not an actual privacy company.
Side note: in case you’re an Apple user and you weren’t aware of this, you can make it a bit better by obtaining your private key so that you have actual E2EE and you can add hardware keys for 2FA which makes it more secure. Of course this should be the bare minimum but it’s nice that they support these things out of the box.
Regarding metadata: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102651#%3A~%3Atext=This+metadata+is+always+encrypted%2CAdvanced+Data+Protection+is+enabled.
Maybe it’s worth checking if you’re okay with what kind of metadata they’re processing.
That will* work.
*actually figure out what you’re trying to maintain privacy from and set up your icloud account appropriately.
This is what I do. You have to be in one eco system at some level these days and Apple painted themselves into a corner with their privacy marketing. Rather only give info to one. Nothing a smart TV does can’t be done on my Apple TV plus Apple TV adds a lot of features if you are an Apple user on other devices.
Apple painted themselves into a corner with their privacy marketing
That’s the cool thing about marketing, you can lie to the plebs and then do crime to fuck them over, daddy Sam ain’t gonna do shit anyway.
I guess it’s a matter of degrees like everything. If they have to give the appearance of privacy, they will concede towards privacy more than say Google who just fucks privacy on the bus in front of you. Unless you go 100% open Linux on every single device, which is hard for most people, you will have some compromises to make. I am still teaching myself Linux.
