I am with you 1000% on this one.
I'll soon be the owner of a smart TV. The old non smart TV died a couple of months back.
That "smart" TV will either be non connected or firewalled to heck and back. I am lucky, in the sense that I control my internet access, and not my ISP, so the house firewall is under my control.
@ParadeGrotesque @kuba_@101010.pl there are still some Safe (i.e. non-Smart) TV options available. For example, you can find some on the Polish site Ceneo:
https://www.ceneo.pl/Telewizory/Smart_TV:Nie_posiada.htm
Be careful, some are mis-categorized. So always check in the specs before you buy. But for example Manta makes TVs without any smart functionality, like this one:
https://www.ceneo.pl/94023747#tab=spec
@rysiek it's better to buy new great TV and just not plug an ethernet cable
@arek they come with WiFi, and I ain't trusting them not to try to connect to some open networks. Or have 4g/5g soon.
@ParadeGrotesque @kuba_@101010.pl
Yup, 4g/5g is the next logical step.
The TV I bought has an Ethernet port, and wifi will be left unconfigured. I think "smart" functions do not include scanning for wifi and cracking WPA codes if an Ethernet cable is plugged in...
Since the TV will be connected directly to the house router/firewall, it won't be able to connect to the Internet.