Texas has opened a sweeping legal and political front against the connected TV industry, accusing five of the world’s biggest smart TV brands of quietly turning living rooms into data-harvesting hubs. At the center of the fight is a simple allegation with far-reaching implications: that the same screens people use for Netflix, Hulu, and YouTube are also tracking what they watch and sending that information to corporate servers without meaningful consent. As the lawsuits move forward, the cases are poised to test how far states can go in policing the data practices baked into modern consumer electronics.
The complaints target a technology that has become standard in high-end televisions and budget models alike, and they frame it not as a convenience feature but as a form of covert surveillance. By casting smart TVs as potential “digital invaders” inside the home, Texas officials are betting that privacy concerns, geopolitical anxieties, and bipartisan frustration with opaque data collection can all be channeled into a high-profile courtroom showdown.
The five brands in Texas’ crosshairs
Texas is not nibbling at the edges of the TV market, it is going straight for the top shelf. State officials say they are suing five of the biggest smart TV manufacturers in the world, naming Sony, Samsung, LG, Hisense, and TCL as companies whose sets are installed in millions of homes across the United States. According to the complaints, these brands dominate the connected TV, or CTV, landscape, which gives their software choices outsized influence over how video viewing data is collected and monetized.
In public statements, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has framed the move as a response to a pervasive industry practice rather than a one-off scandal, arguing that smart TVs from Sony, Samsung, LG, Hisense, and TCL are designed to capture what people watch and then sell that information for targeted advertising. The state’s description of the suits aligns with outside reporting that Texas is suing “five of the biggest” TV makers over alleged spying on what viewers watch, with the complaints focused on how these companies’ CTV platforms track viewing behavior and share it with advertising partners without clear, informed consent from users who bought the hardware in the first place.
How Texas says smart TVs are “spying”
At the heart of the lawsuits is a technology that most TV buyers have never heard of but almost certainly use: Automated Content Recognition, or ACR. Texas officials say ACR runs quietly in the background, scanning the pixels on the screen every few hundred milliseconds to identify what is being watched, whether it is a Netflix series, a YouTube clip, a cable news broadcast, or even a video from a connected game console. Once the content is recognized, the TV can log the program, timestamp, and other contextual details, then transmit that data back to the manufacturer’s servers.
State lawyers argue that this process turns a passive display into an active sensor that “secretly records” viewing habits and builds detailed profiles of households, which can then be used to target ads across phones, tablets, and other devices. Reporting on the complaints notes that ACR can capture information about watched YouTube videos, security or doorbell camera streams, and video or photos shared from a smartphone, which dramatically expands the scope of what a TV can observe beyond traditional broadcast channels. Texas contends that this level of tracking, carried out by ACR technology that many consumers do not realize is enabled, amounts to spying when it is done without explicit, opt-in consent and clear disclosure of how the data will be used.
The legal theory: privacy, deception, and data misuse
Legally, Texas is leaning on a familiar playbook: consumer protection and privacy statutes that prohibit deceptive practices and unfair data collection. The lawsuits claim that the five companies collect “far more” information than is necessary to operate a television, including granular logs of what people watch, when they watch it, and what other devices are connected, then combine that data into profiles that can be sold or shared with advertisers. According to summaries of the complaints, the state says these practices violate Texas law because the companies fail to obtain meaningful consent and do not adequately explain the scope of the tracking in their on-screen prompts or privacy policies.
One cybersecurity-focused analysis of the cases notes that Texas accuses the manufacturers of improper data collection that puts users’ privacy at risk, arguing that the companies’ ACR systems and related analytics tools are designed primarily to fuel targeted advertising rather than to improve the viewing experience. The complaints reportedly allege violations of state privacy and consumer protection laws, describing how the same legal theory is repeated almost verbatim across the suits against each brand. By casting the tracking as both deceptive and intrusive, Texas is trying to position the litigation as a straightforward enforcement of existing rules rather than a novel attempt to regulate advertising technology.
Ken Paxton’s escalating campaign against smart TVs
The lawsuits are not a one-off burst of outrage, they are part of a broader campaign by Ken Paxton to paint certain smart TVs as a direct threat to Texans’ privacy and even national security. In a consumer alert, his office warned that some “CCP-aligned” smart TVs are “spying” on users, describing how these devices can monitor “everything that happens on your screen” and send that information back to corporate servers. The alert, which prominently features the words Breadcrumb, Home, CONSUMER, ALERT, Ken Paxton Warns Texans About CCP, urges residents to scrutinize their TV settings and treat their screens as potential surveillance tools rather than neutral appliances.
Paxton has also touted an early courtroom win, announcing that he secured a court order stopping a “CCP-aligned” smart TV company from spying on Texans while the case continues through the courts. In that release, labeled with Breadcrumb, Home, Attorney General Ken Paxton Secures Court Order Stopping CCP, Aligned Smart TV Company, Spying, his office cast the injunction as proof that judges are willing to step in when manufacturers overreach. Taken together, the consumer alert and the injunction show how Paxton is using both public messaging and litigation to frame smart TV tracking as an urgent problem that justifies aggressive state action.
China, ownership stakes, and the geopolitics of your living room
Layered on top of the privacy arguments is a geopolitical charge: that some of the companies involved have ties to the Chinese state, and that this connection raises the stakes of any data collection. Paxton’s office has highlighted that Hisense and TCL are partially owned by the Chinese government, and he has suggested that smart TVs from these brands pose a unique risk because data gathered in Texas could, in theory, be accessed by entities aligned with the Chinese Communist Party. In one court filing, he argued that companies “connected to the CCP” should face heightened scrutiny when they collect sensitive information from American households.
Critics of the lawsuits have pushed back on the more sensational aspects of this framing, noting that there is no evidence that China has your Hulu password or that Beijing is directly siphoning off Texans’ viewing histories. A detailed commentary on the cases points out that while Texas Attorney General Tom Paxton (as he is referred to in that analysis) alleges that data from Hisense and TCL could be shared with the Chinese Communist Party upon request, the actual complaints focus more on domestic advertising uses than on proven foreign surveillance. Still, by repeatedly invoking China and CCP ties, Paxton is clearly trying to tap into existing anxieties about Chinese technology companies and to distinguish his suits from earlier, narrower privacy cases.
What the lawsuits say about consent and “secret recording”
Beyond the geopolitical rhetoric, the core of the Texas cases is a dispute over what counts as meaningful consent in the age of smart devices. The state argues that when a new TV is set up, users are often rushed through long, dense privacy screens that bundle ACR tracking with essential functions, making it difficult to understand that the television will be “secretly recording” what they watch. In one description of the complaints, Texas says the TVs transmit information about viewing habits back to the company without the user’s knowledge or consent, and that the companies then use that data to build profiles that follow people across other devices they use regularly.
Coverage of the suits notes that Texas accuses the manufacturers of “secretly recording” what you watch through Automated Content Recognition, or ACR, and then using that data to power targeted advertising campaigns. Another report emphasizes that late-night streaming sessions can be logged every 500 milliseconds without clear consent, creating a near-continuous record of what appears on the screen. By framing the tracking as “secret” and continuous, Texas is trying to convince courts that the companies have crossed a line from ordinary analytics into surveillance, especially when the data can be linked to specific households and combined with other identifiers.
How the data is allegedly used and shared
Texas is not just upset that data is collected, it is alarmed by what happens next. The complaints describe a pipeline in which ACR data is packaged and sold to advertising and analytics partners who use it to target ads on phones, tablets, laptops, and other connected devices. One summary of the lawsuits explains that the TV makers allegedly take detailed logs of what people watch, then sell that information to ad companies that can match it with other data sets to build robust consumer profiles. State officials say this turns a private viewing session into a commercial asset, often without the viewer realizing that their habits are being monetized in this way.
Analysts who have reviewed the cases note that Texas claims the manufacturers collect far more data than is needed to operate a television, including information about other devices on the same network and the apps and services people use regularly. Another report on the suits says that all five companies are accused of collecting “far more” data than necessary and of putting users’ privacy at risk by sharing that information with third parties. By focusing on the downstream uses of the data, Texas is trying to show that the harm is not abstract: the state argues that the tracking feeds a broader advertising ecosystem that can follow Texans across platforms and devices long after they turn off the TV.
Industry norms, messy complaints, and early criticism
For all the alarm in Texas’ rhetoric, the practices it is targeting are not unique to the five companies in the dock. ACR and similar tracking tools have become standard across the TV industry, and many streaming apps and devices collect detailed usage data as part of their business models. One analysis of the lawsuits describes them as a “hot mess,” arguing that while there are real privacy issues at stake, the complaints sometimes conflate standard advertising practices with more speculative national security fears. The same commentary notes that the Paxton lawsuits, filed in Texas, repeat the same legal arguments almost verbatim across the different defendants, which could make them vulnerable to procedural challenges.
Other coverage has emphasized that Texas is suing “all of the big TV makers” for spying on what people watch, and that the state’s aggressive framing may outpace what the evidence can prove in court. A report on the connected TV market points out that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has described smart TVs as an “uninvited, invisible digital invader,” language that underscores how much of the fight is being waged in the court of public opinion as well as in legal filings. Even some privacy advocates who share concerns about opaque data collection have questioned whether the lawsuits’ focus on China and “CCP-aligned” companies distracts from the more universal problem of how modern devices track users by default.
What Texas is telling consumers to do right now
While the lawsuits wind their way through the courts, Paxton’s office is not waiting for a final judgment to urge Texans to lock down their TVs. In a consumer alert, the attorney general warned that “all across Texas, there are smart TVs acting as uninvited, invisible digital invaders,” and he urged users to dig into their privacy or system options to disable tracking features. A separate advisory explains that within these menus, consumers can often turn off ACR, limit ad personalization, or opt out of certain data-sharing arrangements, though the exact steps vary by brand and model.
Local coverage of the lawsuits has gone further, offering step-by-step instructions for some popular platforms. One guide tells viewers to press the Home button on their remote control to access the main menu, then navigate to Settings and look for privacy or data options that control content recognition and ad tracking. The same report notes that the surge of interest in these settings is directly tied to concerns about consumer data harvesting, as people who had never touched their TV’s privacy menu are now trying to figure out how to stop their screens from logging every show, movie, and video they watch.
Why these cases matter beyond Texas
Even if the lawsuits are narrowed or partially dismissed, they could still reshape how smart TV makers present their privacy choices and how regulators think about consent in the living room. Texas is arguing that a brief on-screen prompt buried in a long setup flow is not enough to justify continuous ACR tracking, especially when the data is used for advertising rather than for core TV functions. If courts agree, manufacturers may be forced to adopt clearer, more granular opt-in screens, or to separate essential features from data-hungry extras that users can decline without losing basic functionality.
The cases also highlight a broader shift in privacy debates, from browsers and smartphones to the growing constellation of connected devices in the home. Smart TVs sit at a particularly sensitive intersection, because they are both entertainment hubs and potential windows into other devices, from game consoles to security cameras. By suing Sony, Samsung, LG, Hisense, and TCL over how their sets track and share viewing data, Texas is effectively arguing that the living room deserves the same level of privacy protection that lawmakers have begun to demand for web browsing and mobile apps. However the courts rule, the message to manufacturers is clear: the days when ACR and similar tools could operate quietly in the background, with little public scrutiny, are coming to an end.
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