48-page report urges FTC, FCC to investigate connected TV industry data harvesting.
The companies behind the streaming industry, including smart TV and streaming stick manufacturers and streaming service providers, have developed a “surveillance system” that has “long undermined privacy and consumer protection,” according to a report from the Center for Digital Democracy (CDD) published today and sent to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Unprecedented tracking techniques aimed at pleasing advertisers have resulted in connected TVs (CTVs) being a “privacy nightmare,” according to Jeffrey Chester, report co-author and CDD executive director, resulting in calls for stronger regulation.
Because selling the data your SmartTV collects, is a massive revenue stream for these companies. Selling only dumb TVs wouldn’t be as profitable as a SmartTV would be.
Also the ad space that could be projected to these, based on collected data is another massive revenue stream.