LG, as one of the leading manufacturers in the smart television market, responded with an official statement to serious allegations that its devices eavesdrop on users and collect uncontrolled data. While the company firmly denied the accusations that televisions record ambient sound in standby mode, it confirmed that it detects other connected devices by scanning the local network in the home.
What Did the Gamers Nexus Research Reveal?
At the center of the discussions is a comprehensive security research published by the Gamers Nexus team, known for its technology-oriented content. The report, based on network packet analysis and firmware reviews, claimed that approximately 216 million LG smart televisions active worldwide aggressively monitor user habits. The research claimed that the devices mapped all hardware on the local network, captured audio through the microphone even in standby mode, and even stored some text transcripts in plain text without encryption.
LG: “Ambient Sounds Are Not Recorded and Not Sent to Servers”
The expected statement from LG regarding these findings, which had a wide public impact, was not delayed. The company emphasized that the televisions do not record ambient conversations and do not send them to external servers without the users' knowledge. According to the statement, the audio processing process only comes into play in two specific scenarios:
How Does the Audio Processing Process Work?
Physical Command: The process is initiated by the user pressing and holding the microphone/voice button on the remote control.
Hands-Free (Far Field) Detection: If explicitly enabled by the user in the menu, the system only triggers when the wake phrase “Hi LG” is detected.
The company admits that the TVs listen for the wake-up command while in standby mode; However, he states that this listening takes place entirely on-device, and that the voice data is instantly deleted unless the command word is detected. Therefore, it is stated that media conversations are not transferred to the company's servers.
Local Network Scanning Adopted: Is It a Standard Feature?
LG did not step back regarding local network scanning, which is one of the items that security experts focus on the most. Confirming that televisions scan smartphones, printers, computers and other IoT devices connected to the same Wi-Fi or Ethernet network, the company argued that this is an industry standard function for device discovery and seamless pairing in smart home ecosystems.
Touching on the Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) technology used in personalized content and ad targeting, the technology giant reminded that this feature is optional. LG states that ACR data is not processed for ad targeting unless the user gives explicit permission.
Unanswered Security Questions
Although LG's statement aimed to alleviate concerns about audio listening, some critical technical details raised in the Gamers Nexus research remained unanswered. In particular, the fact that the official text does not include the claim that system records and some text dumps are kept unencrypted has not completely resolved the doubts of privacy-oriented users. Data security and user privacy discussions in the smart TV market are expected to come to the fore more frequently in the coming period.
