Security researchers have revealed that LG smart TVs are capable of comprehensive network surveillance, scanning entire home LANs to identify and catalog devices including phones, smartwatches, and other connected gadgets, even when the television appears to be powered off.
The investigation, led by Gamers Nexus in collaboration with Level1Techs and independent security researchers, used Wireshark packet captures to document the behavior on LGs premium OLED TVs, including the G5 model which retails for over $2,500. The G5 crawled our entire network and found dozens of unrelated devices, including smartwatches and phones of our staff, said Steve Burke, Gamers Nexus editor-in-chief.
The packet analysis revealed that LG TVs can identify IP addresses, geographic locations, names and signal strengths of nearby Wi-Fi networks, channel numbers of neighboring networks, and internal IP addresses of other devices on the network, even devices not connected to the TV. Critically, this is native TV functionality, not an exploit or vulnerability.
The findings extend to audio recording capabilities. Researchers demonstrated that LG TVs can capture and store microphone audio in plaintext while the TV is completely offline, meaning data collected could be transmitted to LG servers whenever the TV reconnects to the internet. It does not cost a lot to store text forever, noted Level1Techs Wendell Wilson.
LG Ad Solutions has previously marketed its ability to reach 363 million addressable secondary devices in the US, suggesting the network scanning data feeds into the companys advertising business. LGs official response claims the TV scans are for device connectivity, content sharing or smart home functionality.
The investigation also revealed that using an LG TV as a dumb monitor does not necessarily disable all tracking functionality, and that the broader smart TV ecosystem poses similar concerns, particularly as ISPs broadcast neighborhood Wi-Fi networks that devices may auto-connect to.
