EDIT: A rough timeline of events here:
- In 2024, a user noticed this odd traffic on their local network, took a screenshot of the graph, and posted it to Twitter
- After discussing the issue with other Twitter users, the original poster realized that this graph was actually a mistake with their router or something. This reporting software was reporting some other device’s network traffic as being the washing machine’s traffic. The washing machine was actually only using a reasonable amount of data.
- Despite this past revelation, in 2026, someone put together a “meme” of sorts comparing the supposed events in that 2024 graph to what people in the past had predicted the future to be.
- For whatever reason, that “meme” was put through AI post-processing of some sort. Was the attempt to “upscale” this image after it had been passed around and been automatically compressed down by various platforms? Or was it someone using some newfangled AI-assisted compression technique in an attempt to create a smaller file size than any of the more traditional compression techniques? No idea. Whatever reason was, the image was left with a bunch of nonsense text on the graph portion.
- I saw this “meme” and decided to share it here without scrutinizing the text on the graph. As mentioned in my first point, this graph was originally posted years ago, so I was already familiar with it and did not feel the need to read into it in the image I was sharing. I felt safe assuming it was just the same graph that I remember seeing years back.
- After users here called out the nonsense text, I just recreated the “meme” from scratch. I grabbed the original screenshot of the graph from Twitter and a stock photo of clouds, and then combined them along with some text so that this is more-or-less the same exact “meme”, just without the AI gibberish.
WHY DO WASHING MACHINES HAVE ACCESS TO THE INTERNET???
Related: a criminal group managed to steal data from a casino thanks to their internet connected fish tank. In 2017
HAHAHAHA
the hell? why the fuck a washing machine needs a wifi for? to google how to wash clothes?
Just wait until you find out about wifi connected toothbrushes
man, i’m living under a rock - why the fuck would you need a wifi on a toothbrush?
Bored household item developed sexting addiction with ChatGPT
Lesson: never buy an appliance that has internet connectivity.
1980: “I bet there will be flying cars in the future!”
2026: “Oh…nonononononono. That would be far too dangerous. Not after 9/11.”
80: “9/11?”
26: “Yeah, they flew a bunch of planes into buildings, and blew up the pentagon, and the world trade center buildings, and an empty field in PA.”
80: “Why would they blow up an empty field?”
26: “Because those men and women inside that plane are HEROS!”
80: “I don’t understand…”
2020: “Hey guys!”
26: “Oh god! 1980, put this mask on. 2020 is here.”
80: “I don’t understand whats going on…”
20122016: "I just shot a gorilla, and altered the future!20 and 26: “FUCK OFF
20122016!!!”Harambe was in 2016, unless you’re from the alternate timeline where the event actually happened in 2012.
Harambes demise was fortold by the Mayans.
…ok, either you somehow have the ability to alter google results before I search for them, or this is some Bearenstein Bears Bullshit!
I SWEAR it was in 2012…wait, was Kony 2012 not in 2012? I remember them both happening in the same summer.
The world ending thanks to the mayans was 2012, harambre was the confirmation that the world ended in 2012
Me after 9/11/2001 seeing all the American flags being waved, reminiscent of Nazi Germany: “I sure hope this doesn’t lead where it looks like it could lead…”
Later: “Fuck.”
My dishwasher keeps begging for internet. And it can keep on fucking begging.
Depends on the manufacturer, it can be useful. Here’s my dishwashers internet usage:
Basically two notifications, one that it’s done one that a machine cleaning is needed. Less than a Kilobyte of data.
I know that it’s done when it stops making noise.
“and in case it starts making noises I don’t recognize, there is a shotgun nearby”
My dishwasher is not audible in the middle of the night if I stand more than 5 steps away. During the day with all the noise of daily life… not even if I hug it.
That’s fair, honestly I was mostly joking. I just have a fairly deep distrust of IoT devices, even if not for the privacy angle they’re generally not built with robust network security in mind.
Does your dishwasher not have a drying cycle?
If only there was a way to show that information on the actual machine. The one you need to be in front of to do anything about the information.
If I’m in my office I need to first get to the dishwasher. If I’m on my way home I can’t turn on the oven to preheat. If my kids leave the fridge open I want to be notified before all the food is ruined, even if I’m at work.
I know that lemmy is fully of contrarians, but not everything is a conspiracy theory. Sometimes progress is useful.
You really should not turn the oven on remotely, especially when you have kids. Also your food will definitely not be ruined because your kids leave the fridge open for a few hours. And for the dishwasher you can just set a timer.
The oven is set high and has triple isolation, even after 1 h it’s barely hot on the surface, plus the kids are with us when shopping. The fridge will surely compromise the food, plus consume a lot of energy. And no timer can select the mode of the dishwasher, or change or on the fly or integrate projected solar production.
I will not make my life more expensive,.more risky and less comfortable to save 1kb of internet traffic.
If you have meat or dairy items in your fridge, those can become unsafe to eat after only 2 hours. Since the cold air is more dense, it spills out the bottom of the fridge and gets replaced by room temperature air rather quickly. I’ve definitely eaten my fair share of questionable foods going past this, but the calculus changes if you’re giving that food to other people.
As for the main point, agreed. I’m definitely not a luddite, but if I had kids who weren’t yet responsible enough to not leave a fridge open for hours, I think I’d just put child locks on the fridge and make sure they had access to something else.
You really should not turn the oven on remotely,
Neighbors house almost burned down because of remote controlled device. It was a sauna stove instead of a oven and didn’t even have network, just control panel outside of the sauna where you could turn it on without checking the stove first. Kids had left some plastic toy on the stove. Gladly they noticed the smell just in time, few minutes more and smoke would have ignited, at least according to firemen who were alerted on site.
My stove has option for remote control too via simple relay input so I could just throw in esphome or whatever on it and control it across the world over home assistant, but for that exact reason I didn’t install anything on the header.
Yeah but i did the same thing with a zigbee socket.
Which i just stuck in there as a route booster between the main house and basement brewery (under kitchen)
It’s not the same (I have that setup for the washing machine which doesn’t have wifi). You just get on/off status and power usage, enough for notifications alone. You don’t get other info, or control. Like start the dishwasher remotely on a fast cycle because unexpected guests. Or on the eco cycle when solar power is available. Or pre-heat the oven when leaving the store with frozen pizzas.
It’s not a must have thing, but a nice comfort feature.
Yeah all this sounds really nice for with a home assistant setup. I’d love to be able to start my washing machine to start while I’m at work so it’s done when I get home and can throw it in to the dryer real quick even though I’m busy that day.
Yeah nah they’re not big enough carrots for the concerns introduced
What exactly are the concerns?
Privacy concerns, unecessary technical faultpoints, ownership and control concerns, security vulnerabilities (that then offer a jump point to compromise the rest of the network), bullshit repair hampering…
I volunteer my private information. Here it is for you too: I run the dishwasher at 55C in eco mode which takes 4h and 5 minutes. There, now the whole internet knows about it. It doesn’t have a camera pointed at my bed, it’s a dishwasher.
The wifi is not needed for it to work, it’s an addictional interface. If anything it provides redundancy, in case some of the buttons (which are exposed to water and chemicals) fail.
All my IoT devices are in a separate vlan and ssid, so security doesn’t worry me much
And regarding repair, I chose this brand because they offer replacement parts even for 20 year old appliances, with manuals how to repair it yourself. And again, if the wifi fails I will still have the buttons.
- Spying on you (yours doesn’t seem to do that yet, but see pt.2)
- Getting hacked because the domain it communicates with wasn’t renewed and got hijacked by scriptkiddies
Overall I’m quite excited about smart home stuff, but it must live on its own isolated network with some device I have full control over as a bridge to the internet (home-assistant+tailscale or a similar setup). No “IoT” device should have direct internet access, ever.
Point 1 doesn’t concern me much because the oven doesn’t come with a camera or microphone. At most they might know how hot I bake my pizza at. I can tell you all here: it’s 180C.
Point 2 doesn’t either, all IoT devices run their own WLAN isolated from my network and each other.
Similar setup here, home assistant bridge which is then available via reverse proxy from the internet.
any kind of unified interface for all those smart gadgets?
Home assistant
groovy
New kink unlocked
For what it’s worth, my LG washer has sent 14.3 MB in the past MONTH, but my Unifi router has misidentified my Nvidia Shield TV as another LG washer. The Shield has downloaded 11.6 GB in the past month, mostly from YouTube. While I don’t doubt it’s possible for a washer to send/receive that much data if it’s compromised and part of a botnet, I’d also question whether the device in question is actually an LG laundry appliance.
why do you even need to have your washer connected to the internet at all?
Knowing when the washer is done with a polite buzz on my wrist is way better than not hearing a beeper from 3 rooms away. It also reports your energy and water usage so you can learn about where you use resources.
There’s a lot to be gained from smart appliances, it’s just that our current system makes the manufacturers adversarial to the users unfortunately.
I just set a timer. As for knowing how much energy it uses: How much can you change once you know? You only get a few options on the machine to make any difference. Knowing this stuff is useful before you buy it, not after.
I wonder what happened to the capability of people to remember a time and read a watch.
I think you skipped the rest of the reply
If your washer and dryer are running for a fixed amount of time instead of monitoring the status of the clothes you are wasting valuable resources.
What status is there to observe in a washer? Loading weight and program are considered and a time is calculated at the start. And a dryer can work the time it needs. Standy by needs almost no energy, certainly less than fancy computational boards in “smart” stuff.
My washer also monitors soiling levels to decide how much water to dispense.
because those people don’t think, they do what they are told by companies. there is ZERO logical reason to have the thing connected to the internet.
it won’t add soap…it won’t add clothes…it won’t remove clothes…
there is nothing that machine can do better while connected to the internet vs offline…if there is, then it’s a limitation/problem specifically designed to make the product worse, in order to manipulate people to sign up for stupid crap.
If you really don’t think there’s a legitimate reason someone might want their washer connected to the Internet, you need to get out more.
Have you considered that a washer might be in the basement? And the person might be 2 floors away where they can’t hear it? And they might appreciate being able to get a notification when it is complete to remind them to move it to the dryer?
Open your mind a little more.
Have you considered that you could learn how long it takes to do a cycle and then set a timer on your phone?
That’s more effort per wash instead of being something that only needs setting up one and then will work forever. Also, it’s common for post-90s appliances to include sensors and vary the cycle time based on how dirty the water gets. Except for the data privacy and security concerns, which are mainly because it’s proprietary software rather than inherent in Internet-connected devices, there’s no advantage to using your phone timer over getting a notification.
lol… more effort to set an alarm ve goes through the hassles of dealing with companies bullshit? yeah… ok, totally more effort. I don’t buy that for one second… it’s exhausting dealing with crappy software and companies that purposely tamper with their own products for profits
That’s a proprietary software problem rather than a being connected to the internet problem. One of the send-a-notification-when-it’s-done devices I set up took about as much effort as setting the right time on a phone alarm about ten times because the device’s firmware was open source with no companies’ bullshit involved, so all I had to do was navigate to the right page in Home Assistant and pick the right phone from a dropdown and the right even for the notification to trigger on from a dropdown. That’s not wildly different from picking the right time from a dropdown on a phone.
It won’t work forever. It’ll stop working once they stop supporting the app or shut off the servers.
Again, that’s specific to it being proprietary software. I’ve got some devices in my home that are connected to the local network (but not the internet), and have configured Home Assistant (which I’ve got running on an old desktop PC) to send a notification to my phone when it detects that those devices report that they’re finished with what they do. That’ll keep working until I turn off the Home Assistant server or replace the devices.
Whether or not I can isn’t relevant to whether I want to or not. My point is that you act like you can’t conceive of why someone would want it that way. It’s an absolutely narrow minded stance.
Or to start it late in the work day so you can throw it in the dryer when you get home without leaving clothes wet for 9 hours. Some may not understand why that matters, but some of us have fairly busy social lives and turning the active part of a load of laundry from 2 hours to three 5 minute increments that can be done at my convenience sounds really nice actually
Now, personally I’m unwilling to let my washer speak to the internet directly, but it is why if I had a house I’d look into something I can connect to my homeassistant setup without letting it speak to the internet directly
I think that you and I are roughly of the same temperament when it comes to what we expect of devices. But can you really imagine
ZERO logical reasons
that anyone might want to? Like getting an alert when their stuff is done?
My phone already does that because I set a timer on it cause I’ve done my laundry before and I know how long it takes to do a cycle.
“How long it takes to do a cycle” is dependent on the mode and settings you pick. Congrats on your streamlined existence, though.
Okay. Pick those settings and set a timer for how long they take. Streeeamlined.
yeah but s tying an alarm is hard… apparently.
it’s so much easier hooking the washing machine to the Internet, downloading the app, creating an account, remembering the password, updating firmware, getting constant notifications that Samsung has a sale on something you already bought, doing the firmware again because it failed, bricking your washing machine and waiting for AI to go all possible scenarios to fix it to then hear you need a new one.
I wouldn’t mind being able to start my washer remotely - I want it to run while I’m not home because it’s noisy, but I don’t want the wet laundry to sit all day like it would if I started it and then went to work.
Doesn’t practically every one have a delayed start option?
Or start it right before you leave. I swear, people in this thread are bending over backwards to try and justify having to connect appliances to the internet. It’s wild.
I mean, in a vacuum, a smart washer is a nice idea which is actually useful. Set the time to start the washer to 430 so it finishes when you get home. That’s a good and useful improvement.
In practice however, gestures wildly there’s the obvious data collection both of your laundry habits and anything the app on your phone can reach.
I’m not opposed to smart tech, but it has to actually benefit to product. A smart TV is a better TV (again, the data collection BS, but I am ignoring that for the moment). It can launch Netflix or Hulu or whatever, and you can watch from the comfort of your couch without another device. It is doing TV better than a non smart TV.
Also, I would love it if there was a good FOSS TvOS.
That’s having wet laundry sit for most of the day, which the person above already said they didn’t want to do.
You think I can remember to set that?! Well look at you, miss functional adult!
I have my air fryer connected to the internet
I wonder if usage of a phone app for controling and such impacts data use. If the app connects to an LG server before processing the task or notification, maybe its also grabbing a bunch of data from the phone as well?
What kind of permissions does the app ask for? That’ll tell ya right there.
The only permission I have enabled for LG ThinQ is notifications. I also have a Home Assistant integration that has access to my LG washer/dryer
Why do you have it hooked up to the Internet?
“Sock! Sock! Sock! Sock! Sock! Sock! Sock! Sock! Sock! Shirt! Sock! Sock! Sock! Sock!” - LG Dishwasher, probably.
I believe that if a dishwasher sees a sock, it might be used for the wrong purposes.
You don’t know me.
If you give it a sock, it will become a free dishwasher.
I wonder how many cum socks it would take to poison the data collected 🤔
Bro
If they ever sell a smart hammer that measures my impact strength and sends it to some system somewhere for further analysis then I’m giving up building. Let the damn AI build. Why does the world incorporate tech even when it adds nothing to a pre-existing method and drives up the price? Oh…I get it now.
Because “data is the new oil.”
Doesn’t matter what that data is, collect it first, and figure out how to sell it later.
except this oil is like 99% useless given the current scope of data collection.
You say that, until your hammer data is used to detect improper use, which your employer’s insurance can use to deny a claim.
Or it can be used to void a warranty. Or it could detect G-forces of your commute to work and raise your car insurance rates for hard accelerations. Or a biometric sensor in the handle can tell your boss if you can work another 30 minutes before there is a financially significant risk of heatstroke.
You get the idea, that data is useless, until some hairbrained jackass packages it and sells it’s to an even more unscrupulous asshole.
i wonder why the governments haven’t close this shop given how fucked up this whole thing is… oh wait…
Psssst. They’re “in on it.”
yeah. fuck this shit!
…sells it’s to an even more unscrupulous asshole.
just how fucked up it can get?
Period tracking apps are selling the data of minors to states where abortion is illegal in order to to see if they become pregnant (or un-pregnant).
Need I go on?
And the typical consumer has no critical thinking skills and also, is ignorant, and very often a moron, and a sucker. People aren’t smart. The appliances are lol. And the people at the top of giant companies have a greed that is insatiable.
I think the typical consumer just does not give a fuck. The rest are as you say. The rest after that are complicit.
Though it would be cool to do that and then set up microphones to pick up the house settling sounds and see if there’s a correlation. If only those with the resources to set that up could be trusted to not abuse that access to data because I wouldn’t consent to some data firm having access to mics in my place.
The products are made to male the owners Roch not benefit the users.
Pretty disappointed in Lemmy not noticing and downvoting this AI slop.
I’m all for calling out bullshit IoT garbage but zoom in and look closer.
Update: op updated the photo with a non AI image that’s the same but without hallucinated text. The original graph was real and made by a human, but through memes got degraded and an AI upscaler added new hallucinated text to it. Mystery solved and fixed.
You’re right, but also, why did someone use AI to make this image look worse??
The original is included in this article: https://www.tomshardware.com/networking/your-washing-machine-could-be-sending-37-gb-of-data-a-day
Lovely_reader doing the real investigative journalism here, I love it ☺️
So yes it’s ai slopified, but it is also a real graph that didn’t need to be slopified but was done so using AI upscaling.
So, everyone is right in a way fun twist 😅
Pretty sure I saw a post version of this like a year ago or so, with the font not janky in any way
For a while, I carefully scrutinized every image for signs of AI
Now, I’ve decided to not bother with a close examination unless it’s important for some reason. There’s not enough time in the day
I always notice and downvote the ai slop but here I don’t see the patterns?
Also I think I saw this graph from more than a year ago
Edit: op replaced the ai slop graph with the original one so that’s why I didn’t see the garbled text
What makes you think this is AI?
I mean, if you zoom in and actually read the text, it very quickly becomes noticeable as fake
Look at the numbers on the scale. Look at the “Downloaid” numbers. Look at the fact that “Syert” is apparently a data unit.
Or how about the fact that something apparently managed to “Uploaid” 97.70 Bytes? Not KB. Not MB. Bytes. You can’t upload .7 bytes, because a byte isn’t divisible by 10. A byte has 8 bits, so it is only measured in eighths. You could upload .625B, or .75B, but not .70B.
Worst part? The original is super easy to find, and also didn’t need up-scaling at all.
Maybe it’s in Gaelic
On the day that’s between 31\ and 59, the scale that goes from 15poc to 301 000 is making up less Uploaid, of which the total is 53,8B Syert. Both totals are 3.66 GB
It’s been around for several years. It’s probably been passed around so much that the image quality degraded and someone sharpened it with AI which disrupted the text.
I saw this probably 6-7 years ago on reddit, the answer was that the appliance was attempting to download and install an update, then failing the update for some reason, so it was constantly re-downloading the patch all day.
Nothing nefarious or AI slop (other that some crappy image correction) about this.
Interesting. The image seems to have been fixed now, I didn’t know that’s possible. As for your theory, it would then show download traffic, not upload like seen here. I hope the washing machine got fixed too.
My brain hurts
Uploaid and downloaid, and many of the numbers in the chart are in no order
The suggestions that are being used as placeholders for numbers.
True however it could be ai upscaling. I seem to remember this post or at least something similar.
Shit almost missed it. Thank you.
What is a reasonable amount of data for a washing machine to use (other than zero)?
There is no other reasonable amoujt
I imagine a darkened office in the far outreaches of an LG research facility where a hermit lives.
They call him the stain expert. He gazes at this data all day.
I think in 1980 3.7 GB of data seemed further away then a flying car.
That’s…actually a really good point
We have the tech for flying cars, it’s just not practical or economical. We’ve even got flying bikes and good jet packs
Flying cars would be a nightmare for the FAA. Helicopters are enough for cases where you need to land in a small area where fixed-wing aircraft can’t
The idiots around my place can’t even get around in regular cars. Pretty damn sure half of them would be dead within 2 months so it’s flying cars.
Oof imagine the severity of car accidents when they occur in the sky
Isn’t someone in China trying to do flying taxis. No idea about plausibility I just read things on the interweeb.
I know that in Moscow you could order a “flying taxi” with Yandex.Taxi (russian uber thing), it was actually a tiny two-seat helicopter. I suspect that Chinese “flying taxis” would be quite similar.
80s cyberpunk where they have video calling and moon resorts, but the internet is closer to a system of carrier pidgeons than whatever the fuck this is.
