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random_walker's profile
Arvind Narayanan
Arvind Narayanan
Arvind Narayanan
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@random_walker

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Arvind NarayananVerified account

@random_walker

Princeton prof. I use Twitter to share my research and commentary on algorithmic fairness, AI hype, the surveillance economy, tech policy, and academic life.

Princeton, NJ
cs.princeton.edu/~arvindn/
Joined December 2007

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    Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

    When we watch TV, our TVs watch us back and track our habits. This practice has exploded recently since it hasn’t faced much public scrutiny. But in the last few days, not one but *three* papers have dropped that uncover the extent of tracking on TVs. Let me tell you about them.

    6:08 AM - 27 Sep 2019
    • 4,194 Retweets
    • 6,086 Likes
    • øivind 🇳🇴 Vinod Chopra Monika Halan Yu-Shan Fung 🧢🍎✏️⚖️🔬🍜🍦 Lakshman 🕯 Pete Channy Gauthier Mr. Fuck-up
    110 replies 4,194 retweets 6,086 likes
      1. New conversation
      2. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        The first paper looked at Roku and Amazon Fire TV. These platforms let you subscribe to “channels”, which are basically apps. As you can guess, they are loaded with trackers. Doubleclick alone is on 97.5% of Roku channels. https://tv-watches-you.princeton.edu/tv-tracking-acm-ccs19.pdf …pic.twitter.com/gGphX2sPwd

        11 replies 214 retweets 585 likes
        Show this thread
      3. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        There are some channels with over 50 trackers. Also, the majority of trackers were able to grab a unique ID such as MAC address. A few channels leaked email addresses to trackers and many leaked video titles⁠—often unencrypted, so your viewing history is exposed on the network.pic.twitter.com/wPMP7suWFS

        1 reply 137 retweets 451 likes
        Show this thread
      4. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        Reverse engineering is hard. The paper was possible due to the hard work and ingenuity of the five PhD/postdoc authors Hooman Moghaddam, Gunes Acar, @baburges, @aruneshmathur, and @danny_y_huang. The other authors are @feamster, @EdFelten, @prateekmittal_, and me.

        2 replies 57 retweets 623 likes
        Show this thread
      5. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        The most technically challenging part of the paper was building a bot to automatically install thousands of channels, launch each channel, navigate to a video, watch it until encountering an ad, and collect data on everything that happens behind the scenes.pic.twitter.com/27z2JU5fHe

        5 replies 57 retweets 480 likes
        Show this thread
      6. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        Here’s a doozy: Roku has a “Limit Ad Tracking” option. Turning it on increased the number of tracking servers contacted 🙃 It did prevent Roku’s AD ID from being leaked, but a whole bunch of other unique IDs are available. Even Pi-hole wasn’t that effective at limiting tracking.

        13 replies 238 retweets 873 likes
        Show this thread
      7. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        The second paper is by researchers at Northeastern University and Imperial College London. They have an impresive testing setup! https://moniotrlab.ccis.neu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/ren-imc19.pdf … Here’s a thread from one of the authors: https://twitter.com/proffnes/status/1174255273042743297 …pic.twitter.com/xcYKEXG0kC

        2 replies 64 retweets 380 likes
        Show this thread
      8. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        They analyzed 81 IoT devices including five smart TVs. Their method was quite different from ours: they did controlled experiments. This is powerful: for example, they can test if devices phone home when someone starts talking or moving. Good news: none of the TVs did. Bad news:pic.twitter.com/NGm9ex9kvC

        9 replies 377 retweets 806 likes
        Show this thread
      9. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        Some of their findings are what you’d intuitively expect: devices made by Chinese companies tend to talk to Chinese servers. Others findings are more surprising: Nearly all TVs they tested contacted Netflix, even though they never configured any TV with a Netflix account (?!?!)

        5 replies 148 retweets 598 likes
        Show this thread
      10. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        The third paper is from my colleagues @danny_y_huang Noah Apthorpe Gunes Acar @frankli714 @feamster (I wasn't involved). They built software called IoT Inspector that lets you examine your own IoT devices and, in exchange, contribute data for research.https://iot-inspector.princeton.edu/ 

        3 replies 110 retweets 498 likes
        Show this thread
      11. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        Arvind Narayanan Retweeted Arvind Narayanan

        It’s a really neat tool that I’ve tweeted before. Over 4,300 people have installed it and the team has just released their first set of findings using data on 45,000 devices, including nearly a thousand TVs from 19 vendors. https://arxiv.org/pdf/1909.09848.pdf …https://twitter.com/random_walker/status/1116674411862556672 …

        Arvind Narayanan added,

        Arvind NarayananVerified account @random_walker
        My colleagues have released a neat tool you can use to monitor — and be creeped out by — your "smart" devices https://iot-inspector.princeton.edu/  @kashhill found her coffee pot sending data to Microsoft and her Echo connecting to 17 different domains every few minutes when *not* being used. https://twitter.com/kashhill/status/1116018130084433920 …
        2 replies 83 retweets 374 likes
        Show this thread
      12. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        (By the way, what I love love love about the three papers released near-simultaneously is that we now have three different ways to interrogate Smart TVs and IoT devices. It bodes well for future efforts to uncover tracking and surveillance in our homes.)

        3 replies 67 retweets 466 likes
        Show this thread
      13. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        IoT inspector’s findings on TV tracking are consistent with the other 2 papers. In their sample, they find about half the TVs talked to tracking services (the authors tell me they think this is an undercount because many of the TVs were turned on only briefly during the study).

        2 replies 34 retweets 223 likes
        Show this thread
      14. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        One creepy finding in this study is that some TVs connect to Automatic Content Recognition services. ACR involves sending a “fingerprint” of your screen contents to a server, say once a second, for a Shazam-like algorithm to figure out what you’re watching to serve you ads.

        8 replies 161 retweets 376 likes
        Show this thread
      15. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        OK, so our TVs are watching us. Is that so bad? Well, TVs are going down the same road that turned the web & smartphone apps into a cesspit of surveillance. I worry that things like TVs ads emitting ultrasonic beacons for analytics will become more common. https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/05/theres-a-spike-in-android-apps-that-covertly-listen-for-inaudible-sounds-in-ads/ …pic.twitter.com/jWD3rv0T0O

        10 replies 189 retweets 489 likes
        Show this thread
      16. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        It’s unfortunate that TV platforms are turning to targeted ads as the main way to make money. To maximize revenue, they will likely turn to data mining and algorithmic personalization/persuasion to keep people glued to the screen as long as possible.https://digiday.com/media/rokus-advertising-business-outpacing-hardware-business/ …

        3 replies 84 retweets 311 likes
        Show this thread
      17. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        Unlike web tracking, our ability to control tracking on TVs is also limited, because TVs are closed platforms and there is no analog of browser extensions. And, in a familiar story, the law and regulations are easily worked around. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/09/18/you-watch-tv-your-tv-watches-back/ …pic.twitter.com/X442obQrHj

        5 replies 81 retweets 311 likes
        Show this thread
      18. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        I'm sorry to leave this thread without a satisfying conclusion. It's not obvious what's the most effective way to push back against privacy intrusions in our homes. I think more awareness is a necessary first step, and I see the recent papers as progress. I hope more will follow.

        12 replies 34 retweets 317 likes
        Show this thread
      19. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        There are steps we can take. Stay away from vendors whose business model is targeted ads. Every device is a potential tracker; do your research before buying. Install tools that give you control, such as Pi-hole, even if imperfect. Install a monitoring tool on your home network.

        15 replies 87 retweets 420 likes
        Show this thread
      20. Arvind Narayanan‏Verified account @random_walker 27 Sep 2019

        These individual steps are not enough: we need collective action. Researchers must keep doing our part; we look forward to teaming up with journalists, civil society organizations, and the public, so that we can choose our future, not sleepwalk into it one channel at a time.

        26 replies 57 retweets 471 likes
        Show this thread
      21. End of conversation

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