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LG smart TVs caught logging audio with screen off and snooping on local devices
(www.notebookcheck.net)
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this post was submitted on 07 Sep 2026
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There's a lot of misinformation in the comments here.
Yeah, it's installing drivers on WINDOWS.
So, caveat two is don't connect these things to an internet-connected WINDOWS machine.
Good point.
But, as others have said, if you do successfully air gap one of these things, it might stop working because a hard drive is full, or more directly because it can't phone home and is designed to lock you out in that case.
On Gamer's Nexus's video on the subject at 1:20 you'll hear how they talk about how LG accesses your network data through windows.
I think it's important to note that I didn't say in my original comment anything about it using your windows Internet connection to send and receive that data that it collects via microphone or that it may have accessed through your Wi-Fi network if you happened to connect it to that.
I think people assumed (it's early for me, my bad) that I meant it was transmitting this data that it collected over your windows computer's Internet connection but that wasn't what I was intending to claim. When you connect an LG device (Television or Monitor) you agree to allow that device access to your network and they literally say they have full access to your device both in the TOS and in device settings . They gather all the information of every single device connected to your TV. Their apps can "use all system resources" and "access your Internet connection".
0:47:00 of this video gives more detail about this. https://youtu.be/Q9uefFYe6bM?is=xKJNG-RT_j_2Tw1U
"Sending ACR data to advertising partners thru inputs like HDMI"
https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/216-000-000-spy-tvs-the-lg-smart-tv-problem-gamersnexus-investigates.352429/
Do you have any sources for that? Not doubting it just curious about how that works.
https://www.theregister.com/personal-tech/2026/07/21/lg-monitors-are-using-windows-11-feature-to-serve-adware/5275486
https://www.pcmag.com/news/lg-to-remove-unwanted-monitor-pop-ups-following-nudge-from-microsoft
This is literally in the video.
https://www.s-config.com/stopping-a-smart-tv-from-being-used-against-you/
These do not support your claims.
See the third link and watch the video.
I think you're misunderstanding what's happening. The LG TV isn't directly using the Windows internet connection. It's taking advantage of Windows Update to have Windows itself install malware as a driver update for the screen.
Which I think is actually worse, because it shows that Microsoft is complicit in this nonsense.
I'm not. It still takes screenshots regardless of whether it can access your Internet connection to receive data or send it.
What I'm saying (though I failed at being clear) is that it will take screenshots of anything you put up on the screen (passwords, Internet connection data, Bluetooth device data etc). There was something in one of the videos I linked in another comment about it also collecting data via Bluetooth scanning.
Plus, if the device has ever been connected to a Wi-Fi network and you don't disable wifi (in settings or physically on the board) there's a significant possibility it will try to access the open networks around you. If your neighbor has an open guest network? That's all it needs to continue to upload that information to the cloud.
I also seem to remember LG deliberately limiting 3rd party apps ability to use or create peer to peer networks but I haven't seen anything about them limiting their own first party apps or OS. I wonder if that's part of the alarming stuff Gamerz Nexus alluded to in the video when they talked about vulnerabilities that could compromise these TVs.
It was something like 5 am when I wrote my initial comment and I wasn't fully awake yet. I'm sorry if it came off wrong but I didn't intend to say that LG TVs were using HDMI connected computer's Internet connections. Just that they can see anything and everything you can see when you connect and set up that device.
Nobody ever factory resets a TV before they get rid of it. If your trash guy decides to take home the TV you threw away and hook it up to the internet, or if you sell it, the next person might hook it up to the internet.