Posted by stalfosknight 1 day ago
* number of adults in the house hold (people who have access to the account)
* when you are home
* opening fridge/doing laundry/etc. I have no idea if their app has an excuse to ask for location- but app location tracking would be the most valuable data
* even if you don’t share location- these things are on your network and any regular and simple network scanning would show when certain devices are home and we they are not home and what schedules they follow
This isn’t even very imaginative, just the basics really. I would not be surprised if you could guess the household size solely based on the number of times a fridge is opened in a day. You could at least determine between a person without a family vs. family- that’s useful for ads. Are these the fridges that have cameras in them ‘so you can see what you have while at the grocery store’? Throw some image detection in there and you now know brand targeting and if they cook regularly or eat out. A goldmine of data really.
But that was a hard no for me. I just left all of that alone - we have a ISP set-top box that comes with FTTH tv and few services so I don't need to log in anywhere else.
Mother has a hearing aid and she wanted to try Bluetooth connection - devices paired without mobile app but she couldn't lower volume down on tv nor on her device, even with aid's own app.
It still wasn't as bad as expected. I read some of the experiences people had where they couldn't even get into the home screen of tv before agreeing for network connection or login to some cloud services.
Fiends got some 4k Samsung for their new house - it comes with some AI features because of course it does. They said that they couldn't easily find picture controls and every show was automatically adjusted on brightness, saturation etc., making anything pain to watch.
They also got washing machine/dryer combo from Samsung as well - weeks after someone posted on our discord server video from Polish store where bunch of guys "hacked" similar smart-enabled machine and launched... youtube with that dancing "6 grams" cow clip. What a time to be alive.
Using a service is an ongoing relationship, and relationships change over time, sometimes for the worse. This needs to be factored in as risk, every time someone makes a purchase that includes a service.
OT - This reminds me of the digital billboards on the highway that change before one has the chance to understand what it's advertising. I don't even have the chance to count the seconds before the ad changes much less see what it's advertising.
What is a contextualized ad?
This is distinct from demographic (trends based on physical attributes, like age) or geographic or behavioral (your buying patterns) and they already know the device targeting because it's their fridge.
Classic digital advertising vectors.
Another one: "you have consumed 20 units of alcohol this week, and run out. Should I order this 25 pack that is cheaper?"
I know, I know, I suffer daily from government overreach ;) But have you tried lobbying for your fellow humans?