Samsung Privacy Policy: Watch What You Say Around Your Smart TV
— -- Shhh ... not around the TV!
Samsung's privacy policy for its voice-recognizing smart televisions warns users not to discuss sensitive information around their devices because it could be transmitted to a third party.
"Please be aware that if your spoken words include personal or other sensitive information, that information will be among the data captured and transmitted to a third party through your use of Voice Recognition," the company's privacy policy said.
Parker Higgins, an activist with the nonprofit Electronic Frontier Foundation, pointed out what he said were similarities between George Orwell's dystopian novel "1984" and Samsung's smart TVs.
A Samsung spokesperson told ABC News the company "takes consumer privacy very seriously."
"Samsung does not retain voice data or sell it to third parties," the spokesperson said. "If a consumer consents and uses the voice recognition feature, voice data is provided to a third party during a requested voice command search. At that time, the voice data is sent to a server, which searches for the requested content then returns the desired content to the TV."
Customers who are still worried about a potential spy lurking in their living room can easily disable voice recognition in the settings menu of their device.
