December 23, 2025
Your TV’s a tattletale
I didn't realize my LG TV was spying on me until I turned off this setting
Readers say every brand is snooping and the lawsuits are coming
TLDR: LG’s Live Plus tracks what you watch to target ads, but you can turn it off in settings. Commenters say all brands do this, cite a Texas lawsuit, brag about blocking TV requests, and mock cookie pop-ups—making it clear smart TVs’ “recommendations” feel a lot like snooping.
LG’s “Live Plus” feature—basically your TV taking notes on everything you watch to serve ads—got outed by a user who flipped it off, and the comment section went full popcorn. The strongest mood? Outrage mixed with “we told you so.” One top comment drops a bomb: “Texas is suing all of the big TV makers for spying on what you watch” with receipts on Hacker News. Others piled on with the familiar refrain: it’s not just LG—Samsung, Sony, Roku, Hisense, TCL… they all do it via ACR, which stands for automatic content recognition (translation: your TV watches your shows to sell ads).
Privacy die-hards are flexing their setups, like the user whose LG tops their home blocker (Pi-hole) for “most blocked requests,” while another commenter roasted the meta moment: “Valnet and our 346 technology partners ask you to consent… Oh, the irony,” calling out cookie pop-ups while we’re discussing surveillance. The veteran crowd linked posts from 12 years ago saying this has been known forever, sparking a mini-fight between “it’s normal for recommendations” vs. “my TV is a snitch.” And just to spice it up: LG reportedly auto-installed Copilot on TVs recently, fueling the vibe that smart TVs are getting a little too smart for comfort. Drama level: binge-worthy.
Key Points
- •LG’s “Live Plus” uses ACR to analyze on-screen content to provide personalized recommendations and advertisements.
- •The article provides specific steps to disable Live Plus in LG TV settings under General > System > Additional Settings.
- •LG’s settings note that enabling Live Plus allows recognition of displayed content and use of viewing information for personalized services.
- •Similar ACR-related settings exist on other brands; the article details how to disable them on Samsung and Roku TVs.
- •DirecTV launched a live TV app on the LG webOS app store, and LG’s latest webOS update automatically installs Copilot on LG Smart TVs.