@samsung Smart TV Listening to you – How DSP enables Voice Recognition in Smart TV's to make our lives more convenient

Samsung just can't seem to catch a break with their Smart TV like their JS8500 Series of Smart UHDTV’s that uses Quantum Dots Technology that were launched earlier this year at CES 2015 as stated in the Geezam blog article entitled “Samsung's SUHD Smart TV running Tizen OS as UHD Alliance Grows and Internet of Things Beckons”.

Aside from being as expensive as a Car, they may not be selling well after this latest report suggests that the Samsung Smart TV may be listening to your conversations as stated in the article “Your Samsung TV is eavesdropping on your private conversations”, published February 10, 2015 By David Goldman, CNN Money.

The issue seems to be stemming from the fact that most of these latest Samsung  Smart TV, specifically the models that come with a built-in camera and microphone, such as the Samsung PN60F8500, have Voice Recognition built in that allow the Televising set to be controlled via Voice commands.

However, it get a little sticky for Samsung when you read their SmartTV Privacy Policy, part of which reads as follows: “Please be aware that if your spoken words include personal or other sensitive information, that information will be among the data captured and transmitted to a third party through your use of Voice Recognition”.

Samsung Smart TV Listening to you – How DSP Works to enable Voice Recognition in Smart TV

This implies that your spoken words are possibly being recorded by the Samsung Smart TV. However, this is not the case as the Smart TV isn't necessarily recording your Voice all the time. 

Samsung says the feature is only active if you've activated it and is only working when a microphone symbol appears on the screen, indicating clearly to all in the room that it's actively listening out for Voice Commands.

The Samsung Smart TV actually compresses your Analog Voice into a Digital PCM (Pulse code Modulation) Data Stream. This is then compressed and transmitted over the Internet to their Servers then routed on to the Servers of a Third Party company for Signal Analysis to determine if you spoke any commands to the Smart TV.

Once that's determined via DSP (Digital Signal Processing), it then sends back the commands as an electronic signal in order to execute any commands that it captured from your speech. To quote Samsung's statement on the matter, quote: “Samsung does not retain Voice data or sell it to third parties. If a consumer consents and uses the Voice recognition feature ... the Voice data is sent to a server, which searches for the requested content then returns the desired content to the TV”.

However, it gets a little complicated when the Third part company, which Samsung has admitted is Nuance as noted in the article “Not in front of the telly: Warning over 'listening' TV”, published 9 February 2015, BBC News, becomes involved.

Nuance, the same Tech behind Apple's Siri Voice Recognition Software as noted in the article “Report: Apple using Nuance Voice tech in data center”, published May 9, 2011 4:09 PM PDT by Josh Lowensohn, CNET News are the ones are responsible for translating your Voice into commands that the TV can execute.

Turns out the Samsung SmartTV may be still listening out for those Voice Commands even if you’ve disable the Voice Command feature, meant that the symbol with the Microphone isn’t showing on the screen.

This as Samsung has set of pre-programmed Voice commands that Samsung listens and collects in a bid to analyze how often you use certain commands. Again, this Signal Processing is done by Nuance, on Samsung's behalf; Samsung doesn’t store or actively has employees from Samsung in South Korea listening to your Voice, as DSP is done by a server running the Signal Processing Software.

Folks, this is not George Orwell’s telescreens in his novel 1984 that listen people in their homes!

Samsung's Smart TV's are listening to you - How Voice Recognition is making our lives more convenient

Samsung isn't the first company to be fact with problems relating to their Smart TV's being suspected of allegedly capturing information about consumers.

Products like Amazon Echo, Microsoft Xbox One, and Motorola Moto X have Voice Recognition features that are also actively listening to your Voice, which is processed by a Third party company to execute commands as noted in the article “Be Careful What You Say Around Your Samsung Smart TV”, published FEBRUARY 9, 2015 BY STEPHANIE MLOT, PCWorld.

In late November 2013, a UK IT consultant found his LG TV was collecting data about his viewing habits and serving up advertising based on what he choose to watch, even if you disabled that setting as noted in the article “LG 'looking into' reports its smart TVs are sharing private data”, published November 20, 2013 4:48 AM PST by Nick Hide, CNET News.

LG apologized about the incident as noted in the article “LG says smart TV data collection will stop with firmware update”, published November 21, 2013 7:52 AM PST by Roger Cheng, CNET News, quote: “LG regrets any concerns these reports may have caused and will continue to strive to meet the expectations of all our customers and the public”.

They then issued a firmware update to disable the data transmission and stop the reading and transmission of the data files stored in on USB flash drives or external drives on the same Wi-Fi Home Network as the Smart TV.

Unlike LG, however, Samsung's feature can be disabled by simply following a few commands as noted in the article “Disable this feature to stop your Samsung Smart TV from listening to you”, published February 10, 2015 3:34 PM PST by Dan Graziano, CNET News, no firmware update needed:

1.      Got to the Settings menu

2.      Select Smart Features

3.      Scroll to Voice Recognition

4.      Select “Switch it off” to turn the Voice Recognition feature off

You'll lose the convenience of using Voice commands all because you might not like being the possibility of served a few Ads. By doing this, you can at least it'll put your minds at ease as to whether or not a third-party company using Samsung’s Smart TV is collecting Voice Data on your bedroom trysts.

Plus the Voice commands feature is always there, readily accessible by pressing the microphone button on your remote, should you miss Talking to your TV.