On Fri, 10 Mar 2017 12:59:23 +0000, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:

Just been listening to a radio piece about those Samsung smart TVs the
CIA etc have apparently hacked so they can listen to what's going on in
the room. So wondered if any of the computer savvy types could explain a
few things I've observed with my voice activated Samsung TV.

1) If it is in standby, it no longer appears on my LAN.

It might wake upo every few minutes to phone hoime and ask if it is
needed!

2) I'm not aware of a method of bringing it out of standby over the
internet. (it can be set to look for software updates etc overnight,
though)

See above.

3) The LED on the front of the set changes colour between standby and
on. Think most would notice if it was on when meant to be off.

Probably software controlled so could lie!

4) Can the really very cheap microphone fitted to such things
differentiate between the speech or music etc from the TV's own speakers
just a few inches from it and pick up intelligible speech from the other
side of the room?

That I am less sure of. You are the expert here ...

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