Brave is not spyware. That website you linked is horrible and full of misinformation. They also claim that Firefox, and even Tor Browser, are spyware. They act as if any and all connections a browser makes are automatically bad and used for spying/tracking.

I won’t disagree with the other criticisms of Brave that you made, but just wanted to point that out. That website is just highly unreliable and makes verifiably false claims about the browsers it reviews.

I don’t think you can install microG in this case unfortunately, since 1: the lack of signature spoofing by your stock OS, and 2: the signatures/package name microG uses have already been used by the official Google Play Services in this case, so I don’t believe Android will let you re-use them for microG.

I would just recommend uninstalling any Google apps and Samsung bloatware and any other garbage that you can through ADB in this case if you haven’t yet. It can be a bit hacky and isn’t perfect, but its definitely the best option you have since you’re unable to install any custom OS.

I tried Gmaps WV but it still needs google play services to work.

GMaps WV definitely doesn’t need Google Play Services to work FYI, though nowadays its developer recommends just using Google Maps with uBlock Origin in incognito in a browser like Mull instead anyways.

You’re off to a good start, I’d recommend reading through and following this guide, its the best resource out there at the moment for Linux hardening/security imo.

As far as anti-viruses/virus removals/etc go:

• For Windows & macOS, I would just enable and use the built-in anti-virus protection (Defender on Windows, XProtect on macOS).
• On macOS, I would also enable and use the built-in firewall (Nearly every other OS already comes with a firewall enabled out of the box, no idea why macOS doesn’t enable theirs by default…), as well as Lockdown Mode if you’re able to.
• On Linux, I would use ClamAV & ClamTK.
• On Android, I would use Hypatia & Auditor.

I would also strongly recommend making use of DNS level protection through a service like NextDNS, ensuring you have a good content blocker like uBlock Origin in your browser, and using Safe Browsing in your browser (As long as you use a good browser like Brave or Firefox, then Safe Browsing won’t endanger your privacy, it just improves your security and protection, so I’d recommend using it).

As far as encryption goes, I would recommend just using whatever is built-in to your OS, such as BitLocker on Windows, FileVault on macOS, & LUKS on Linux. You can also use VeraCrypt if you wish to as well, may be preferable in some cases, though I personally don’t bother.

Googling it and according to one answer the only difference between uBlock Origin and AdGuard browser extensions is that uBlock has a feature where they can hide stuff instead of completely blocking it.

Does AdGuard have anything equivalent to uBlock Origin’s advanced blocking modes? That’s mainly what I meant by “advanced features”.

The entire desktop app, yes. That does DNS blocking. Not the browser extensions, no blocked features there.

I know their Safari extension has some blocked functionality without paying, but fair enough, it may be different for other platforms, I’ll edit my reply then. Thanks for the correction. I stand by the other point though, I think uBlock Origin has an inherent advantage and added trust by being non-profit and fully community driven vs. AdGuard being ran by a for-profit company.

AdGuard being ran by a for-profit company and some of the functionality being locked behind a paywall probably doesn’t help its case compared to uBlock Origin, though AdGuard is definitely the next best option currently. I also just find uBlock Origin supports more advanced features.

(Edit: Apparantly the paywall only applies to the Safari extension and their desktop app, but not the extension on most platforms, see the reply below, my other points still stand)

There isn’t much worth responding to in your wall of label-dodging sophistry.

What are you still trying to insinuate by this? Why can’t you just accept the fact that we have different opinions and there’s nothing wrong with that, instead of accusing me of “label-dodging sophistry” or whatever else you can come up with. I never personally attacked you or your politics at all, so its just hard for me to understand why you’re being like this. It isn’t that deep. You’re just treating me like I went out of my way to shit on you or your politics, when I never did, my point was completely irrelevant of any political belief I or you may have, unlike what you keep trying to frame it as.

Politics exist, “bullshit” to you or not. Almost everything imaginable has political context and connections even if you plug your ears and make loud noises.

Wow, I didn’t realize I said politics didn’t exist, thanks for informing me of that. Is there anything else I never said that I should know about?

Like no shit, of course politics exist, and sure, a lot of things in life are political, but usually not to this extent that they are currently, and some people just want an escape from it through places like a general memes community that has nothing to do with politics in nature, that’s all I was trying to say. People have a right to criticize or be annoyed by that, that was my point, but you can’t seem to comprehend that.

You’re not sorry. Spare me the Reddit cliches.

FWIW I do genuinely feel bad for having to respond this way to you, I’m perfectly open to talking to people with different perspectives or opinions than I have, but instead you chose to make a bad faith comment attacking me and completely twisting what I said, it’s unfortunate.

I don’t think you’re willing to leave your bubble and see that the world is larger and more intersectionally connected than your selfish whining about how the world other people inhabit isn’t as comfortably easy for you to ignore anymore.

I think you base your entire life off of your political beliefs and can’t understand that others don’t feel the same way. It isn’t that hard to understand.

I’ve considered setting up a passthrough VM like this (and almost did), I’m just reluctant to I guess because of how much work it takes to configure and get going, and how little I actually use Windows anyways, so I just stick to dualbooting when I really need it. I definitely wish the process of setting up the passthrough VM was easier, but like you pointed out, it’d probably be a good learning experience.

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Yep, they’re horrible. I always disable internet on them, uninstall any apps I can, and generally do what I can to avoid using the built-in smart TV, but I shouldn’t have to do this, its unfortunate and sucks to deal with. They just take advantage of consumers who don’t know better, wish the TV market wasn’t like this. :/

How did you misconstrue and twist my point this badly? You just made a few massive jumps here that make no sense to me at all, and I’m not sure as to what brought you to those conclusions based off my reply. Maybe this is a joke that I’m missing?

Things you are fine with aren’t bullshit to you and therefore they are nonpolitical.

??? Political things are political. Nonpolitical things are nonpolitical. What I’m “fine with” has nothing to do with what I find political or not, and I never claimed otherwise. No idea where you got that from or what in my reply alluded you to that. Did you read a different comment and just accidentally reply to mine? Genuinely wondering at this point, that would explain it for sure.

At the end of the day, I’m not promoting or defending a specific political agenda like you’re making it out as, you have no idea who I am or what my political beliefs are or what I’m “fine with”, I’m just saying I think political shit as a whole shouldn’t be as prevalent as it is here in a random general memes community that has nothing to do with politics, and people are totally justified to be annoyed by or wanting to criticize that. I just don’t understand at all why you’re trying to make this out as some double standard, when it doesn’t exist.

Things that affect other people, making other people concerned about them, are bullshit to you because you got yours.

Are you trolling? This is a general memes community, not a political recruitment center, like what??? Plenty of political and social issues directly impact me, but its irrelevant, and I still think its weird to force them into places that are completely unrelated, like a general memes community for instance. Not everyone makes or wants their entire life to be about politics, sorry I guess?

I also never called any specific political issues or concerns bullshit… I assume you misunderstood my saying of “real life’s bullshit”, but I think it’s clear and painfully obvious what I meant by that with the context, that life is full of issues and shit that go on 24/7, and sometimes people just want an escape and break from it over the internet, so no idea how or why you’re twisting it this much, just like you’ve managed to twist everything else I said here. :/

I’m sorry but I don’t believe you made this comment in good faith at all, this is by far the dumbest and weirdest comment I have ever received in my life, if this was Reddit, I would give you an award for it, gg, like literally… what am I reading here? All you did was completely twist what I said and jump to massive conclusions about me, you should genuinely be ashamed, this is just embarrassing.

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Everything is political and you should be able to accept it popping up everywhere.

True, god forbid people have an escape from real life’s bullshit in something like a meme community.

I seriously don’t understand this original post or comments like this here at all. It doesn’t make any sense to me how you guys can’t see why people are annoyed at seeing politics 24/7 on Lemmy, even in random completely unrelated places, like memes. If you want to start your own politically charged memes community, then go for it, but I don’t understand at all why that content should be posted here in a general memes community that has nothing to do with politics in the slightest, or how/why you guys are justifying it. I don’t think it’s a big ask at all, but I digress.

Is this the part where I act surprised?

This is a very fair concern.

However, the thing to consider is with these Smart TV’s, and generally poor privacy companies and devices, is that they’ll always use the lowest hanging fruit where possible. I’d say the amount of data that the device will go through the lengths to collect offline and later upload are quite low.

Most Smart TV’s collect data from when people directly use the Smart TV itself (i.e. what apps and content you directly watch and download on it as an example). The vast majority of people who buy TV’s like this will just use the built-in Smart TV for watching media and for doing everything on the device, without even giving it a second thought, so the manufacturers basically automatically win and get data on 99% of consumers, without really any effort or work.

For people like us who do care and go through the trouble of circumventing it (i.e. not using the built-in Smart TV at all, and disconnecting the TV entirely from the internet besides for updates occasionally), I’d say that only leaves 2 issues: listening through the mic (I think this is unlikely since voice recordings take up a lot of storage space, as well as bandwith to upload, and like I said in my first comment, TV manufacturers really cheap out on these devices and cut corners wherever possible, and back to my point of the low hanging fruit, but regardless, if you’re concerned, then removing the mics or taping them would certainly solve this), and recording or storing what you view through other inputs like your streaming box (again I feel this is unlikely for same reasons as voice recording, it’d take up a lot of space and bandwith, isn’t quite practical, and they typically focus on the low hanging fruit).

These are both possible concerns, but I’d say they’re realistically extremely unlikely, especially due to how much effort and work it would take to spy on such a small portion of people. The investment and the amount of work and effort needed to do this just doesn’t make sense and isn’t really justified for them. If you’re still concerned, then I’d recommend just putting your TV behind a VPN and putting it into a separate VLAN whenever you do connect or update it (and also just taping/removing the microphone like I said above), or of course if you’re extra paranoid, you can always just leave it fully offline and deal without updates. But I personally just don’t see it as a major risk or something to worry about.

There definitely needs to be regulations on these devices, its completely unacceptable in its current state. It shouldn’t be this hard to just get something like a TV without it spying on you and completely invading your privacy, but I guess that’s the world we live in now. :/

The world of TV’s is pretty tricky for privacy right now, there’s a lot to say on it, so here’s my recommendations.

I recommend just getting any TV and disconnecting it from the internet, the brand shouldn’t matter. You can connect it to the internet every now and then to check for software updates (i.e. any bug fixes or new features being added), but for the most part I’d leave it fully offline, and would also recommend uninstalling any apps possible that are installed, to just speed up things, especially since we won’t be using them. All of the TV brands out there are pretty much equally bad for privacy, and will spy on you and collect and sell any data they can, and also built-in Smart TV’s just generally have very poor and slow performance, plus lack support for various codecs and formats, etc. So even besides privacy, built-in Smart TV’s are just a horrible experience and I really never recommend them and don’t see them worth using.

Now, you’ll need to obtain a streaming box to connect to your TV… so that you can actually consume content and use it. You have a few options as far as privacy goes.

• Building/using your own PC, or using something like a Raspberry Pi, with Linux - This gives you the most control possible, but at the cost of being less convenient and requiring much more work to set-up and configure. You will be losing a lot of nice features like Dolby Vision with this approach as well, and will have to do some tinkering and configuring for sure, but overall it could be preferable to some people.

• Apple TV 4K - Out of all the streaming boxes and sticks out there that you can buy, this is undeniably the most private out of the box. Its not a bad device in terms of specs and features (though there are better options for this as I will get to) … but it isn’t ideal though, as it is Apple after all. Despite being better than companies like Facebook and Google, Apple has definitely had some issues with things like privacy. Plus with an Apple device, you lose all freedom and control over it, you can’t even sideload apps on the Apple TV or install something like a VPN on it, plus OS and everything being closed source, etc. This is a hard recommendation for me for most people, but it could be ideal for people who want 0 tinkering or work, and just want something private out of the box that’s simple and easy. Though, I would certainly avoid it for the better options if possible.

• NVIDIA Shield TV - This is what I personally use and would be my recommendation for most people. The specs and features of the device are essentially unparalleled to any other box out there, it even beats the Apple TV in terms of support for codecs and formats. For privacy… out of the box, the Shield is pretty horrible to say the least. Full of Google tracking and spying, and even requires a Google account on first set-up. The good thing is we can fix it. You have 2 options: Either install LineageOS (the Shield is officially supported) for the most privacy possible, or you can just keep the stock OS and use ADB to remove all Google apps and services, as well as any other bloatware and unwanted crap. The downside to Lineage is you lose Dolby Vision, AI Upscaling, and the App Switcher (so you can’t switch apps by double pressing the home button anymore), so for most people, if you go this route I would recommend just keeping stock and removing all of the BS through ADB (You can just use a random burner Google account for set-up). Isn’t 1000% ideal, but overall its really nice and seems to work well, while keeping privacy intact. You can also even use ADB to set a Private DNS, as well as disable connectivity checks (or change the server away from Google), so overall you can get a pretty nice set-up with this, its the best approach imo.

• Dynalink TV Box - While I do recommend the Shield for most people, if its out of your price range and you aren’t willing to or can’t get it (though I can’t stress enough that it’s well worth it for what you get), then the Dynalink TV Box is the next best option imo. It officially supports LineageOS which can be installed, which is what I’d recommend doing if you go for this approach, since the lost features like AI Upscaling and Dolby Vision from the Shield are irrelevant since they aren’t present on the Dynalink box in the first place. This would give you great privacy if that’s the sole thing you’re after.

I’d avoid any other TV box out there besides the ones I just listed, as they all pretty much just spy on you and collect and sell your data, and there’s little to no gain or benefit that I see in using them over your built-in smart TV or any of the other options that exist.

I think overall these are the best recommendations and ways to be able to privately use a TV without it spying on you and phoning home any and everything you do on it. I do hope it gets easier and simpler in the future, but this is what we got for now.

Yeah. In my testing on my Shield 2019 Pro, with Lineage, my biggest problems were:

• No Dolby Vision

• No AI Upscaling

• No App Switcher (Could no longer double press the home button to switch apps)

There were also some other little bugs here and there, but those were my biggest problems with LineageOS over Stock, so I didn’t stick with it. I’m currently just using my Shield on Stock, but with all Google apps and other bloatware and garbage removed through ADB, and while not perfectly ideal, its been a good enough experience, and I think by far the best option currently for a TV box.

This is the way.

Are they begging for another antitrust?