vizio app hacks

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ang1dust

Senior Member
Oct 1, 2009
386
27
Anyone know if XDA will be opening hacking for some of the new tv's with apps built in? Or if anyone knows of a site that supports it?
 

CuF

Senior Member
Aug 29, 2015
157
42
My hope is that they at least add Yahoo View. The app is currently mostly pointless, but the finished version should end up being pretty much the same as Hulu Free but accessible by mobile devices, not just PCs.
It would add some new life to these TVs.
 

Aleki

Senior Member
Jan 18, 2008
52
4
Impressive that this thread has been going for 2-3+ years. Having a ball running PMS on an old Linux box, paired with my Vizio E420i-b0 (2014?) but incredibly disappointed i can't natively access HBO go. Not really looking to buy yet another device to hang around the television, but considered picking up a $30 Chromecast as the SoC seems to be incredibly underpowered and after a while of running Plex, YouTube, whatever app the responsiveness of the tv begins to slow to a crawl -- at certain points you cannot even turn the volume up or down... it'll remember every button press on the remote, but sometimes the delay in reaching the tv is more than 30 seconds. The gf has been using the Plex app on our old Vizio more than Netflix lately, that's a really good sign. It just works.

Bravo to everyone who still gets excited about the potential of these type things. Appreciate this community.

Silly question, but have you disabled the "smart interactivity" setting under admin/reset menu? I've heard mentions about that setting gobbing up resources.
I have a 2015 M60, and have no issues with degraded performance after hours of use.
 
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rehtalb

New member
May 24, 2017
3
1
so much more

While I have nothing to offer I thought because I like the sound of my own voice I would chip in with nothing of value but repetition of other questions or concerns.

Sure it would be simpler to realize that adding no substance benefits no one else, and sure it would be simpler to avoid adding needless text to the thread my particular instance of the exact same concern is obviously more important than the initial question.

Aren't you glad you read yet another useless, non-reply response to the original post. Yes, OP, is a topic and not a person. #duh (NOT pronounced hash tag duh; the delineator is silent)

So what is new with vizio app hacking?

I have expended no effort on the topic myself but as I am more important I need a response over and above the op content.

In short Netiquette has been killed by Social Cancer and willful ignorance.


streaming: dlna

solution to privacy: usenet + ZFS
^ pay the content providers, and retain your dignity
 
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Not 100% certain what the Smart Interactivity setting would be, but I'll go check for it here momentarily. I ended up going the Chromecast route and totally ditching the painfully slow Vizio Yahoo mess. It's not ideal, having to use a phone as your remote control, but once you pair that with a Google Home Mini it really opens things up a bit.

Silly question, but have you disabled the "smart interactivity" setting under admin/reset menu? I've heard mentions about that setting gobbing up resources. I have a 2015 M60, and have no issues with degraded performance after hours of use.

And what's up with the toolbox posting previous to this? Was almost comical, if it weren't so borderline pathetically sad. Ahh well. Different strokes, i reckon. ;)
 

eKoKnight

Senior Member
Feb 2, 2014
59
2
I just came here to find this. lol I have a old Vizio E322VL that was built in 2010 and so far any of the internet apps powered by yahoo seem to be well no longer working except weather and news and Netflix. Either then that. Its not much of a smart tv anymore. Was hoping id find something that could make that old tv even better even after 8 years. Shame really.
 
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Vexamus

Senior Member
Nov 17, 2007
94
36
Bump again. I have a 2015 M55-c2 and I have been able to gain access to the aforementioned terminal but can't really get it to do anything.

My question is, has anyone grabbed some captured packets between the TV and interwebs and checked to see what kind of connections it was making? That might actually be useful in terms of determining some manner of functionality in that terminal screen. I'm hoping it's a lot like the LG TVs were you can send control commands and the like, then I'd be able to integrate my TV's control into my home automation setup. I'm thinking perhaps this weekend, I'll hard wire the tv and setup a tap to capture packets. Play around with using the built-in apps and installing uninstalling. Maybe I'll get lucky and actually be able to capture a firmware update.
 

rgrafton

New member
Feb 1, 2019
1
0
My IR sensor stopped working on my TV... is there a way I can control my tv via tcp/Udp commands over my network? I installed the SmartCast app but my tv doesn’t show up... my tv is an old D series and I guess vizio doesn’t support control of it thru the app...
 

Shiver22

New member
Jul 13, 2019
1
0
Update firmware to get access

Hi I'm a newbie and what I read on here about Vizio being a strip down of Ubuntu makes me wonder if someone ever tried putting an upgrade is of it on a usb drive and renaming it the firmware update file to see if it would try to install the newer version of Linux thinking it's a firmware update? I'm curious what would happen but I don't have an old Vizio to try it on since the one I'm looking at is my friends and is a 55 inch and would never chance bricking it
 

Solace50

Senior Member
Jul 17, 2011
538
73
Hi I'm a newbie and what I read on here about Vizio being a strip down of Ubuntu makes me wonder if someone ever tried putting an upgrade is of it on a usb drive and renaming it the firmware update file to see if it would try to install the newer version of Linux thinking it's a firmware update? I'm curious what would happen but I don't have an old Vizio to try it on since the one I'm looking at is my friends and is a 55 inch and would never chance bricking it

The update would just fail due to the image not being signed by vizio. If im wrong then the device boots its likely the image would not natively contain the drivers and be rendered inoperable and you would need to flash directly to the emmc chip on the board. I rooted one of their tablets a while back that was not a systemless root and caused the integrity check to fail for upgrading the OS. I could only assume they employ some logic behind their TV's since they did for the tablets.

I'm taking a look at the possible attack vectors to get root access to one of these devices which seems to be quite hard since it is quite the limited interface. Root access would allow for custom apps to be side-loaded along with various other possibilities like debugging crashes so Vizio can get their **** together as many have issues with TV's randomly rebooting (Including myself) which I know is not hardware related.
 

Diitron

New member
Jan 3, 2020
1
0
The real fix

Wouldn't it make more sense to find a TV with the same specs and buy a pulled smartcast board for it it seems there dirt cheap on newer d50's. A panel is a panel a t con is a t con and a power supplies is a power supply. Rip that Yahoo board out and put a Google board in for around thirty bucks
 

SK8ITUP53

New member
Jun 3, 2020
1
0
Do these Vizio TV's have Java installed? Because Groovy can be scripted and compiles down to Java code in the end. Might be a valid vulnerability to exploit with the Groovy scripting abilities?
 

notmouserat

New member
Dec 12, 2021
1
1
“Just hook up <other thing> to the HDMI port” or having another device (DLNA etc) defeats the purpose of trying to turn the TV into a standalone show-this-webpage type kiosk display. Mounting a pi inside the TV works, sort of, sometimes.

Some recent Vizio models have an aux 12V header on the board. That’s way better than jamming in a 120VAC power brick, but I honestly have no idea how much current that 12V header can supply, or how long it will be around. Also seems like Vizio is constantly changing the physical design of their 32” models - making it harder and harder to fit anything else - even as small as a pi 3/4 - inside. I want as much as possible built inside the TV so that from the outside (except for the hdmi connection) it looks like a TV.

That’s why I’m trying to figure out if there’s a way to mod the firmware.
 
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tinyheck

New member
Apr 16, 2022
3
1
Hi~ After years of lurking I finally have made an XDA account just to breathe life into this sometimes-resurrectable 2012 topic.

I'm a relative newb in the tech world--a couple of years back XDA helped me flash my kindle fire 7 and I'd never ripped the back of a board off and I think it awoke something menacing and wonderful in me. Anyway, I'm still young enough be so ambitious as to waste my time recycling stuff like this so I'll be heckin' around with Kali to follow the breadcrumbs left here and snoop around the sources y'all have pointed to ambiguously. Just wanted to remind yins that your mischievous approaches and technical guidance for the curious inspires babes all the time. There may be smarter solutions (trust I make this ol' E3D420VX work for me even if it's as a glorified monitor) but I love all of you who persevere to climb mountains just to get there. I'll be back someday~

Gonna drop links to more sources to add to the breadcrumb log:
 
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tinyheck

New member
Apr 16, 2022
3
1
Gonna drop links to more sources to add to the breadcrumb log:

Hack All The Things: 20 Devices in 45 Minutes​

(Vizio @ 21 mins)

How I hacked my smart TV from my bed via a command injection​


Introduction to Reverse Engineering with Ghidra​


Kristin Paget: The Laws of IoT Security​


HACKING YOUR WAY TO A CUSTOM TV BOOT SCREEN​


SAMY KAMKAR: REVERSE ENGINEERING FOR A SECURE FUTURE​


Samy Kamkar: Getting Started with Reverse Engineering​


GoodFET​


GreatFET​

 

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  • 2
    My hope is that they at least add Yahoo View. The app is currently mostly pointless, but the finished version should end up being pretty much the same as Hulu Free but accessible by mobile devices, not just PCs.
    It would add some new life to these TVs.
    2
    Impressive that this thread has been going for 2-3+ years. Having a ball running PMS on an old Linux box, paired with my Vizio E420i-b0 (2014?) but incredibly disappointed i can't natively access HBO go. Not really looking to buy yet another device to hang around the television, but considered picking up a $30 Chromecast as the SoC seems to be incredibly underpowered and after a while of running Plex, YouTube, whatever app the responsiveness of the tv begins to slow to a crawl -- at certain points you cannot even turn the volume up or down... it'll remember every button press on the remote, but sometimes the delay in reaching the tv is more than 30 seconds. The gf has been using the Plex app on our old Vizio more than Netflix lately, that's a really good sign. It just works.

    Bravo to everyone who still gets excited about the potential of these type things. Appreciate this community.
    2
    Hidden Menu/Browser on Vizio E32-C1

    I have a Vizio E32-C1 2015 that I picked up a few months ago. The Vizio e-series are a pretty good deal IMHO.

    I was trying to turn it on in the dark the other day, and ended up pressing some unknown button combination as I fumbled in the dark.

    The result was rather surprising, the TV turned on and revealed a gray screen (from the look of it it was an HTML form) with the title "Opera App Launcher". Below the title was an input field and a submit button. Next to the input field in parentheses was the text "(0-9)".

    I was able to move from element on the page from the arrow navigation buttons on the remote.

    So I entered the number '5' from my remote, and hit the submit button. After a few seconds the Vizio official website loaded up. I was able to navigate the page and browse, but couldn't find a way to return to the grey screen or enter a URL manually.

    So far I've had no luck finding what button combo I entered. From searching the web I've gotten no hits about how to get into the service menu from the e-series, let alone anyone else who has encountered the "Opera App Launcher".

    Has anyone else seen anything like this? I'm really eager to get low-level access to my Smart TV.
    1
    While there might be a good amount of interest with this. I dont see work being done on it, as theres no central OS each tv would be completely different.
    Plus its alot easier to attach a small computer to the tv and go from there

    Sent from my GT-N7000 using xda premium

    I have a Vizio E3D470VX and decided to probe the wazoo out of it. nmap reports on an OS request it's replying Linux, but it's also responding and sending out SSDP requests (most likely the multi media network detection that's incomplete in this model).

    The only open port through the network hookup is 13000. I started this little adventure in a hope of finding a backdoor so I might control my TV with my Kindle (yes, I'm that darn ?lazy? :)) I can't seem to figure out what this port is yet.. No matter what sequence I try sending the port, it closes after a varying input sequence (UDP). Via TCP, it just auto closes.

    nmap hasn't the foggiest either, even after a deep scan+UDP run on the port. But it does look like the TV has a sort of firewall response to SYN flooding, that was comical as I saw the spread between identification attempts widen from 10ms to 8000ms over a period of 6 minutes.

    So, I'd be VERY interested in taking a closer look at this particular port opening. I might not go as far as to jack with the USB ports, sides, who knows if they are even active for sideloading. My real question is... is there some port connection software out there already that will run input/output test sequences to an ip address via TCP/UDP/etc and log the results to a log? I hate recreating a wheel if there's already a tool.
    1
    Hi~ After years of lurking I finally have made an XDA account just to breathe life into this sometimes-resurrectable 2012 topic.

    I'm a relative newb in the tech world--a couple of years back XDA helped me flash my kindle fire 7 and I'd never ripped the back of a board off and I think it awoke something menacing and wonderful in me. Anyway, I'm still young enough be so ambitious as to waste my time recycling stuff like this so I'll be heckin' around with Kali to follow the breadcrumbs left here and snoop around the sources y'all have pointed to ambiguously. Just wanted to remind yins that your mischievous approaches and technical guidance for the curious inspires babes all the time. There may be smarter solutions (trust I make this ol' E3D420VX work for me even if it's as a glorified monitor) but I love all of you who persevere to climb mountains just to get there. I'll be back someday~

    Gonna drop links to more sources to add to the breadcrumb log: