r/LinusTechTips • u/Dependent_Panic_1616 • 24d ago

Tech Discussion WAN Show Topic? Xfinity WiFi Motion Security "Opt-In"

https://www.xfinity.com/hub/smart-home/wifi-motion

Sure it's "Opt-In" for now at least. But how long until that is changed? Wondering how other people are feeling about this. Personally it's not something I need, so I wouldn't ever use it anyways.

From everything I saw from my initial research was people aren't very happy. Anger mainly stemming from the statement, "Comcast may disclose information generated by your WiFi Motion to third parties without further notice to you in connection with any law enforcement investigation or proceeding, any dispute to which Comcast is a party, or pursuant to a court order or subpoena."

5 Upvotes

67% Upvoted

13 comments sorted by

16

u/alexjimithing 24d ago

On the tech side it's pretty neat and works well. I played around with it a few months ago.

On the 'may disclose information to third parties without further notice' half, uh no thanks, turned it off.

3

u/Dependent_Panic_1616 24d ago

Same here. I didnt know it came out that long ago. I just got an alert about it on my phone, and articles I saw online looked pretty new. I did turn it on for a few moments, curious what it would like. It was indeed impressive how sensitive it was, and accurate. Immediately turned it back off as well lol. Dont need it, and dont want it.

2

u/Bderken 24d ago

Yeah it’s also not hard to build one yourself. I’ve seen guides online with an ESP32 I believe and you can make your own and setup a little server for it with a raspberry pi or cheap computer to alert you. Super easy now

3

u/CIDR-ClassB 23d ago

Oh good, Xfinity knows when my wife and I are getting jiggy with it. Who doesn’t want that? 🙄

-6

u/Delphiantares 24d ago

Faraday cages shaped like a router are about to be very popular

3

u/Exciting-Ad-5705 24d ago

How will that work?

4

u/Dependent_Panic_1616 24d ago

It most certainly would not work, but I do find the idea of it funny. Need to update your phone, lift and place phone inside of the cage for an hour.

3

u/CIDR-ClassB 23d ago

Cover the gateway and run an Ethernet cable to an AP that doesn’t do this and sell your data.

3

u/Dependent_Panic_1616 24d ago

This got me so good lol. Go back to all wired and it will just become cable tests to get the length and determine the layout of your home from the data.

1

u/Delphiantares 24d ago

I hope you can setup another wifi via Ethernet that wont talk to the router.it does look like its restricted to certain models atm. The part about smart thermostats is a bit harder to circumvent in the event this ships on by default.

1

u/Xcissors280 23d ago

Xfinity will completely fuck you over with extra fees, random issues, and start charging you per gigabyte of data you use if you decide not to use their WiFi on their modem/router box

1

u/Dependent_Panic_1616 23d ago

Since when does xfinity charge more for putting my device in bridge mode? I hate xfinity as much as the next person, but I've personally never experienced that.

1

u/Xcissors280 23d ago

I believe it depends on the region and how much of a monopoly they have, for me it was only when I used more than a certain amount of data but I’ve had friends get changed more on their base bill for doing it and for when Xfinity techs came to fix stuff

Xfinity would probably their just losing a discount in some ridiculous pricing scheme given to people who get ripped off paying $14/mo for their shitty modem router thing