Samsung TVs have remote kill switch, can disable stolen TVs worldwide

If you own a Samsung TV and it gets stolen, don't worry -- Samsung is here, and they'll remotely disable the TV with its Television Block Function.

Samsung has this feature built into all of its TVs and once the TV is connected to the internet, Samsung's system matches the number on the TV against its database -- if it matches, all of the functions on the TV are disabled remotely, rendering it useless.

The company has used its remote TV disabling feature in South Africa recently, where unrest and looting took place and Samsung TVs were stolen at its distribution center in Cato Ridge. The company knew the serial numbers to its TVs since they were taken from their own distribution center, but I wonder if this was done with its TVs stolen during the massive looting across the US in 2020. Hmm.

Mike Van Lier, Director of Consumer Electronics at Samsung South Africa explains: "In keeping with our values to leverage the power of technology to resolve societal challenges, we will continuously develop and expand strategic products in our consumer electronics division with defence-grade security, purpose-built, with innovative and intuitive business tools designed for a new world. This technology can have a positive impact at this time, and will also be of use to both the industry and customers in the future".

There's no information on whether Samsung is using its feature to find, and secure their stolen TVs or just remotely disable the TV to anger the thief to then steal an LG or Vizio TV that doesn't have this feature built in.

The bigger deal here is that Samsung TVs could be hacked, and remotely bricked.