The award of the most privacy-invasive TV goes to
.. LG ?
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Zero reason to connect any trash like this to your network.
2013: DoctorBeet's Blog: LG Smart TVs logging USB filenames and viewing info to LG servers
Just say no!
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TCL is pretty bad too. I mean.. they all are. Never connecting it to the internet is key. Apple TV is your best option it would appear.
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I have had mild success with an old PC repurposed as a streaming box. Apple TV seems one update away from the same issues.
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Firmware updates? I think LG is an exception here but not all smart TV OEMs allow you to sideload upgrades.
… ok but why though?
Sure, anyone with a privacy mindset should object to the prospect of involuntarily feeding any data to AI
But also, from the mindset of a filthy rotten surveillance apparatus, this seems… idk, stupid?
SmartTVs have no internet browsing, no pictures, no messaging… they’re just, what? Inserting AI into casual TV browsing? Collecting the exact same viewship data each platform is already recording? Reinventing the Neilson box? Adding bloatware to justify a $50 increase for models with expanded storage?
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For real, Copilot and all its AI friends really need to stop with their shovel-tiffication huh. 
I considered rooting my TV back in the day but the lack of support + risk of bricking it, eh.
Indeed, an Apple TV is better than WebOS in the meantime of me making a LibreELEC DIY box.
I don’t think that they would bend the knee to some 3rd party AI integration in favor of their own but yeah, you never know.
Knowing Apple they will never do this, they’re never an update away from doing this
If they’re to be shoving Apple Intelligence into the next TvOS the just like iOS, Mac and iPadOS, it will be optional and will not get in the way unlike LG.
Remember: Harm Reducing/Replacing your Smart TV
Apple already has chatgpt integration, and will soon use Google’s AI in siri.
I think “never” is too extreme. People thinking apple is above enshittification seems weird to me since they have ads in app Store, upsells apple care throughout the UI, and recent news items talk of their renewed efforts to generate more ad revenue. Apple is not the brand it was under jobs, they ship broken UX now unfortunately.
https://9to5mac.com/2025/09/27/apple-subscription-price-hike-tv-plus-ad-tier/
The point isn’t whenever they’re gonna be putting ads or not, it’s that they would never do what LG does in this case which is preinstall a third party app and make it non removable, or that is AI in this case.
And all sources you mentioned, literally are first party, not third party
And I do not disagree that they’re to rely on third party for their AI, they’re just not gonna admit it that on the backend it’s Google Gemini (as it is rumored), they’re still gonna call it Siri/Apple Intelligence regardless. (The only reason they advertised calling ChatGPT is because as it was described when Siri almost had no idea what to do (And it mostly does, Apple Intelligence is just bad in comparison to say Gemini) it sends it to ChatGPT when you say it to do so)
Alright who else wants to miss the point? This is the second/third time today
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I did not miss anything. I object to use of “never” for something entirely beyond your control and which has shown signs of enshittification. This should be a benign thing to understand and accept.
The other claim was it does not install third party softwar, I have explicit examples where it did (which you ignored by saying “it only does XYZ, but…”, which, amusingly, misses the point). This is proof by example, which should also be benign to understand and accept.
Off topic
This conversation also reminded me of a more controversial case was of allowing user data to be handled by a third party without consent: Apple to pay $95m to settle claims Siri listened to users’ private conversations | Apple | The Guardian
This would be like if your TV took your voice recordings and shared them without consent with 3rd parties, which is arguably worse than copilot. Interesting to see how marketing distorts perceptions.
I believe it is naive to trust Apple TV. This does not mean you should not use it, but it does mean that it is perpetually in danger of being turned against you. Same as LG WebOS. The only thing in between Apple and shitty experience is how much will their users tolerate their deviation from the vision of Jobs.
Hence the “just one update away” statement. The statement also does not predict anything about if that update ever happens or not, it just says it can be used to render your purchase useless and entirely against you and you will not be able to do anything anyway.
Both KDE and GNOME have a usable 10 foot experience as long as you have a keyboard/mouse combo like the Logitech K400.
Widevine works OOTB in Firefox on Linux, but most sites will cap to 720p.
An Apple TV is just more shit to track you and eventually become e-waste.
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It’s not even an option if everything isn’t in 2160p.
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until KDE releases their TV interface (https://plasma-bigscreen.org/).
not gonna buy this statement really
until then for better or for worse Apple TV [Or Kodi, nobody’s judging, except a few as always] stands
Maybe I’m misunderstand (or haven’t fully tried yet) but isn’t Kodi (LibreELEC) with an HDCP splitter enough to bypass the 720p restriction and owning your video files at 100% as of today? Mostly just need a powerful enough HTPC FOSS box.
Raspberry Pi 5 is almost there but struggles a little with 4k footage. 
What does Kodi or a splitter have to do with the 720p restriction imposed by Widevine used in Chrome/Firefox?
I don’t know, I’m asking.
Can’t it help to bypass those restrictions?
No.
afaiu:
the Widevine plugin for Chrome/Firefox on Linux only provides the “least secure” Level 3 certification, so streaming sites will not send higher resolution video to it.
Although in the past(maybe still?) you could get 1080p from Netflix by spoofing ChromeOS user-agent(?) and I think Amazon will also do 1080p if the partner allows it.
But for 4k, they want Level 1 (hardware backed enforcement via eg. TEE or proprietary Windows/Mac → Edge/Safari with HDCP 2.2 display).
It isn’t an inherent limitation of the media itself, just of the platforms imposed by their licensing agreements.
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If you need 4K, one of options might be Windows 10 LTSC IoT + one of big screen launchers, e.g.
https://complexlogic.github.io/flex-launcher/
https://github.com/Darkvinx88/TvLauncher
https://github.com/complexlogic/big-launcher
I use Roku personally at the moment, but there is a chance that I may switch to Kodi and my own media server for my TV needs.