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The Smart Home Wi-Fi Trap: Are We All Being Conned by Convenience?
(unknownuniverse.uk)
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this post was submitted on 16 Sep 2026
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Privacy
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Casual users don't need to setup vlans, because they simply don't care.
There is no point hand-wringing about this, they don't care, they don't need our help for this.
Ah, the deregulation mindset.
"If the user is unaware of it, does it really matter if they are harmed by it?"
One of the main points of society as a whole is protecting the people living in it, even if they don't know they are being harmed/exploited/poisoned/etc...
There is nothing nothing to be done. Casual users will literally install wiretaps in their own homes.
You cant help people who dont want or care for the help.
most are just intentionally made ignorant of why they should care and will start to care once informed of how it impacts them personally.
they're like mini-republicans in that respect -- they dgaf until it impacts them personally.
My experience is the opposite they know and they don't care.
They're like maga -- they think they know, but will never truly know until it bites them in the ass like the Latinos that voted for trump and ended up facing deportation because if it.
And even then it'll take a lot of time and continued pain to get them to acknowledge it -- also like the Latinos for trump. Lol
I believe that you are both correct. 8 to 10 years ago I realized how much data these companies and governments gather about me, and it scared the shit out of me. I was not aware before that, so I had Alexas all over my house, smart devices, a Samsung SmartThings, the works.
Then my slow walk to privacy started. My home is fully automated now, down to the sprinklers, but it's all via Home Assistant, frigate for my cameras (inside home assistant), not one of my IoT devices has access to the internet, they live in an isolated VLAN, and I haven't had any mainstream social network account or WhatsApp for over 8 years now.
The fact is that a lot people don't care because they don't know, like me back then, but finally knowing is what jump-started this path.
I do agree that there's no helping someone that doesn't want help, that's a hard fact, but if we do move this information around, we stand to "cure a few normies" along the way.
I knew and I didn't care still don't about some things. And I know others who have an idea but don't care. I'd say right now I'm more anti american then anything else aobtrying to move away from their companies.
American companies are, easily, 90%+ of this shit, so I think you're on the right path.
Smart home stuff is dominated by Tuya, which is Chinese. Even a lot of the american branded stuff is Tuya rebranded. Phillips hue is Netherlands based, and from a quick look isn't tuya. IKEA is also not tuya. The rest, I would basically guarantee are all tuya based.
Holy shit. I didn't know it was possible to acknowledge more than one perspective. You just blew my mind, man.
Kidding. Thank you for actually thinking non-binarily
I mean, you can -- that's what consumer protection regulations are for. It's why people can't sell themselves into slavery even I'd they're stupid enough to want to, for example.
We could do things like, say, entirely outlawing closed-source software in smart home tech, if our government weren't usurped by oligarchs.
A few years ago I got some smart bulbs and plugs and wasn’t really aware about any of this and privacy didn’t even cross my mind
Some of us do care when we find out, but maybe caring starts you down a path of no longer being a “casual user”
All my WiFi smart devices are now on a VLAN with no internet access and controlled locally by Home Assistant through with local Tuya integration
I too, many years ago now started my smart home journey with cheap Tuya devices and didn't know any better. The more I used Home Assistant the further I got down the rabbit hole and learnt about privacy. Now I am a privacy advocate and have a dedicated blog 🤓
You kinda prove my point. Those who care will sell their bulbs or learn vlans. Everyone else won't.