LG Responds to Allegations of Audio Surveillance by Smart TVs

Recent allegations regarding LG’s smart TVs have raised questions about the data they collect without user consent. South Korean consumer-electronics company LG has denied claims that its smart televisions record ambient conversations, listen while on standby, and store recordings for later transmission. On Wednesday, the company informed Al Jazeera that voice data is only recorded when a user presses and holds the voice button on the TV remote or activates the 'Hi LG' wake word, after enabling the Far-Field voice recognition feature. 'Other than these instances, the TVs do not collect or record ambient conversations,' LG stated, adding that voice data is processed only through explicit user commands. 'The audio is immediately deleted if the wake word is not recognized,' the company added. This statement follows a 135-minute investigative report released on Monday by Gamers Nexus, in collaboration with Level1Techs and independent security researchers. The investigation examined LG televisions’ data collection and security systems, raising concerns about how these devices handle users’ private information. By analyzing network traffic and software, the researchers claim to have discovered that these televisions actively track users and collect extensive local network data, including audio transcripts. Gamers Nexus reported that its researchers were able to record audio through an LG television while it was in hibernation mode, indicating that even if the microphone switch on the TV is turned off, other microphones, such as those on the remote, may still be active. They estimated that there are '216,000,000 Spy TVs' in the US alone. LG claims to have 49 million smart TVs in the US and 216 million globally. The researchers noted that recorded background noise could be captured from as far as 12 meters (40 feet) away from the TV. Yash Vekaria, a computer science researcher at the University of California, Davis, emphasized the importance of prompt updates from LG, stating, 'This vulnerability can allow sniffing of much more critical conversations... Imagine government officials discussing national security in their hotel room next to an LG TV.' The researchers further alleged that unmatched wake-word interactions or unclear sounds could remain stored locally, transcribed, and preserved on the device in case the local network is disconnected and uploaded later to LG servers. According to Vekaria, copies can remain in temporary storage spaces, known as buffers, without the user’s knowledge. Privacy risks generally arise from poor design and selective disclosure, with Vekaria noting that a compromised device could execute any command its hardware allows. The researchers also claimed to have found text transcripts derived from audio captured by the television, even after 10-15 seconds of silence following the invocation of 'Hi LG.' Vekaria remarked, 'It raises a question of purpose; a voice command is only useful in real time, so audio queued for later upload is presumably being kept for something else, such as logging, analytics, or model training. LG should explain what.' He added that he is not aware of any concrete evidence that ambient audio or transcripts are used in LG’s advertising or profiling systems. 'What we do know is that LG runs an advertising business built on household data, including the Automatic Content Recognition [ACR] tracking documented in our research, and that its voice pipeline appears to capture and retain more than users would expect.' However, he also suggested that there may be simpler explanations, such as diagnostics or improving speech recognition, which still involve retaining recordings from users’ homes without meaningful consent. The researchers indicated that the televisions scanned home networks for other devices and collected information such as internal IP addresses, nearby Wi-Fi networks, and location data. LG stated that scanning for nearby devices is a standard smart-TV function. Device discovery can serve legitimate functions such as screen casting, media sharing, and connecting smart-home products, according to Anna Maria Mandalari, a lecturer in communications and networking at University College London. LG asserted that ACR, voice recognition, and interest-based advertising are separate features, each requiring explicit user opt-in consent and can be disabled through the TV’s settings. Depending on the implementation of device discovery, Mandalari noted that a television may obtain the names, addresses, manufacturers, and types of other devices on a household network, which can help create a broader profile of its occupants. LG’s advertising arm, LG Ad Solutions, has marketed the breadth of information it can derive from connected households. Corporate videos featured in the Gamers Nexus investigation show LG representatives stating, 'We know who is in the LG household,' and, 'We know which devices are there.' LG told Al Jazeera that it is committed to providing transparency and rejects deceptive practices.