Comcast VP indicates technology to spy on its TV cable customers exists

[truedelphi]

Please see this URL

Cameras in the TV cable box
http://newteevee.com/2008/03/18/comcast-cameras-to-start-watching-you/


Written by Chris Albrecht
Posted Tuesday, March 18, 2008 at 11:42 AM PT

Comcast Cameras to Start Watching You?

If you have some tinfoil handy, now might be a good time to fashion a hat. At the Digital Living Room conference today, Gerard Kunkel, Comcast’s senior VP of user experience, told me the cable company is experimenting with different camera technologies built into devices so it can know who’s in your living room.

The idea being that if you turn on your cable box, it recognizes you and pulls up shows already in your profile or makes recommendations. If parents are watching TV with their children, for example, parental controls could appear to block certain content from appearing on the screen. Kunkel also said this type of monitoring is the “holy grail” because it could help serve up specifically tailored ads. Yikes.


Kunkel said the system wouldn’t be based on facial recognition, so there wouldn’t be a picture of you on file (we hope). Instead, it would distinguish between different members of your household by recognizing body forms. He stressed that the system is still in the experimental phase, that there hasn’t been consumer testing, and that any rollout “must add value” to the viewing experience beyond serving ads. Perhaps I’ve seen Enemy of the State too many times, or perhaps I’m just naive about the depths to which Comcast currently tracks my every move. I can’t trust Comcast with BitTorrent, so why should I trust them with my must-be-kept-secret, DVR-clogging addiction to Keeping Up with the Kardashians?

Kunkel also spoke on camera with me about fixing bad Comcast user experiences, the ongoing BitTorrent battle and VOD. But he mostly towed the corporate line on these issues (the monitoring your living room came up after my camera was put away).

[TechBear_Seattle]

1. Right now, I have direct cabling to my TV. If I ever get a box, though....

It goes into a fully enclosed box. If that means having to get up out of my chair and manually change channels, so be it.

[Pab Sungenis]

14. Get a CableCARD controlled device like a TivoHD.

The FCC requires that cable companies offer the cards so that customers can use any 3rd party boxes or equipment they want. You don't have to rent the cable company's box.

[truedelphi]

16. Thanks for that info!! n/t

[niyad]

2. big brother is indeed watching. one more reason to despise comcast

years ago, when I was living in the south, there was talk of systems to be built into televisions so that people could be alerted to things like tornadoes, etc., even if the set was off. my immediate reaction was, if they can turn it on to talk to you, they can probably turn it on to listen to you (people insisted I was being paranoid)

who in the HELLLLLLL told comcast anybody WANTS this kind of crap?

[MotorCityMan]

3. Great! Maybe they can use this to determine

...what channels I NEVER watch, get rid of them, and stop charging me for them!

I'm SURE this will only be used for the customer's benefit :eyes:

[truedelphi]

18. Ya know something? There have been Senators who have proposed

We can select and be charged for our channels a la carte - and the cable industry carries so much clout that they are ignored!

[htuttle]

4. "6079 Smith W.! Yes, you! Bend lower, please!"

"You can do better than that. You're not trying. Lower, please!
That's better, comrade. Now stand at ease, the whole squad, and watch me."

[navarth]

5. Yet another reason for me to hate Comcast with the intensity of a thousand burning suns.

but they'll hate it when I put duct tape over their little camera.

monopolistic spying mother fuckers. fuck them in the eye socket.

[EVDebs]

6. Copolla is remaking The Conversation, just in time for this new tech

Harry Caul, now working for ChoicePoint and Wackenhut, would be soooo proud !

[truedelphi]

7. Thanks, I somehow had never heard of this movie. U can find a synopsis of it at

http://tinyurl.com/5qg4lo
If like me you are in the dark abt it.


The local film critic here (aka as The Hubby) says it is one of the best movies ever made.

We'll have to Netflix it soon.

[EVDebs]

8. Wiki has some more info on it, which is how I found out about remake

"As of September 2007, Francis Ford Coppola will produce a remake of this movie with Paramount Pictures. The script will be written by screenwriter Stuart Beattie. This new version is set for release in 2009, incorporating post-9/11 paranoia instead of personal demons. Mikael Hofstrom will direct the remake."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Conversation

BTW, tell hubby that the old Charlton Heston classic El Cid is being re-released since Jan 29th I believe

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Cid_(film)

[truedelphi]

9. It looks like those of us who haven't seen it will now have some fun.

I think I'll watch it now - before they can watch me watching it:hi:

[EVDebs]

11. Oh, one more thing: watch Three Days of The Condor

but read this first:


Document reveals Nixon plan to seize Arab oil fields
'70s embargo sparked 'last resort' measure, says British memo

Lizette Alvarez, New York Times

Friday, January 2, 2004
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/01/02/MNG8G427D61.DTL

Three Days of the Condor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Days_of_the_Condor

[truedelphi]

12. Condor is one of my all time three or four favorite top movies

I might ask that they throw a DVD of the thing on top of my cold stiff form before burying me out under a knotty pine.

[EVDebs]

17. New movie coming on Gary Webb (you read it first on DU !)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x352865

[Mountainman]

10. A little piece of duck tape would fix that. Or maybe a full moon once in a while.

[femrap]

13. Egads!

Wasn't it Winston in 1984 that sat just out of view of his TV so he couldn't be seen?

I wonder if they can hear you?????

[truedelphi]

15. It was my reading 1984 that originally made me wonder abt this

that thread got locked as it was speculative - but the information that DU member
"Colbert Watcher" furnished me allowed me to create this OP.