Yes, A smart TV can be hacked, and hacking a smart TV is easier compared with other TVs. The reason behind it is the incapability of a smart TV to have modern anti-virus and anti-malware software installed and run in it. A hacked TV can leak the private information of the users. But smart TV security risks do not mean that you should avoid using these devices.
Rather, you need to find out and tackle the problem. There are a lot of different ways to improve your smart TV’s security and can avoid hacking. Before going into the details of those methods, it is necessary to have an idea about why we need to be concerned about smart TV security.
Table of Contents
Why Security Is Necessary For Smart TVs?
Watching And Listening:
The first thing that makes smart security a sensitive issue is the presence of a camera and microphone in a smart TV. As this camera and mic can be an easy source for hackers to get your private information. Once they get control of your smart TV, watching and listening to you what you are doing at home is not a difficult task for hackers.
Tracking:
Apart from watching and listening, your location can also be visible to hackers. The main thing that makes it probable is the access of streaming services like Netflix, Hulu and etc to your location. The presence of trackers in these services is basically aimed at providing you with the best and most personalized content. But hackers can misuse it.
Leakage Of Private Information:
The possibility of the leakage of private information is also one of the key factors that make you think, can smart TV be hacked. A lot of private information of the users on smart TVs in the form of passwords and search history can become easily accessible to hackers.
How You Can Save Smart TV From Hackers?
As told in the beginning as well that malware or virus protection software can not be equipped or run on smart TVs. But that does not mean that you leave your smart TVs unsafe and in the hands of hackers. Rather you can adopt a lot of different techniques to alleviate these risks as described below.
Make Your Passwords Strong:
It is obvious that the hackers get control over your device or TV by hacking the passwords. After having an access to the device, through a password hack, they get your private information and misuse it.
Therefore, you can make the chances of hacking less to a considerable extent by changing the passwords of your smart TV and that of applications being run on it. The new passwords need to be complex, random, and not easily guessable. In this way, you can make the attempts from hackers fail, thus, reducing the risks remarkably.
Avoid Installing Applications From Untrusted Platforms:
Sometimes, people start downloading applications and games from sources that are not trustworthy. Additionally, they also get apps that are not trustable.
For instance, some of the applications and games do not need camera and mic permission but they seek this type of permission. If it is so, then it is the thing you need to be concerned about and disallow.
Keep Your Device Updated:
If your TV set seeks some updates, allow and update it without any further delay. The update is necessary just because in the majority of the updates, apart from many other improvements, the developers are also aimed at boosting the security system.
The new and advanced security systems are more safe and protected against hacking and other potential risks. Therefore, updating the device to a modern version is also thought to be one of the effective ways of improving the security of a smart TV.
Avoid Unnecessary Enabling Of Camera And Mic:
As we know that the primary source for information leakage or hacking by hackers is the camera and microphone of your smart TV.
Therefore, it is worth considering the factor that turning the camera and microphone of your TV set off, when they are not needed, can reduce the chances of hacking and other similar risks are reduced to a considerable extent.
Secure Internet Service Providers:
Last but not least thing you can do to make your PC or other systems secure and safe from hackers is to make sure that the internet service provider connection is secure. Only a strong password can not provide you with sufficient protection and security.
Rather, You have to secure the connection by using VPN as a shield against hackers. So, whenever you are curious about; can smart TVs be hacked and want to overcome this risk? don’t forget to consider this factor.
Conclusion:
As far as the question is concerned can smart TVs be hacked, in light of the information stated above we can say that yes, they can be hacked. However, it is not a big deal to overcome or avoid these types of risks. This article talks about the ways to protect smart TVs from hackers. These methods explained in this article are very simple and easy to follow.
Not only this but this article also talks about and deals with the questions like can hackers watch you through your TV. And it provides satisfactory answers to this question along with solutions to this problem.
