Monitor vendors are playing with fire.
Scharon Harding – Aug 24, 2026 4:17 PM
Credit: SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Consumer CheckpointThe tech products we rely on are constantly changing. Sometimes those changes bring improvements; other times, they frustrate users or make beloved products worse.
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Ads and tracking have turned TVs into privacy nightmares. Both are so widespread among smart TVs that I’ve written a guide for avoiding them. One recommendation in that guide is to use a computer monitor. But in recent years, monitors have become more capable of pushing ads and tracking users.
Without more straightforward approaches from vendors, such as easily comprehensible privacy policies and avoiding inappropriate ads, monitors are dangerously encroaching into smart-TV-like territory.
