Or they buy access to things like this: https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Sidewalk/b?node=21328123011

No need to include a modem when your customer's neighbor has an internet-connected toaster within bluetooth range of the TV.

My god damn CPAP machine does this. Insurance required the modem in order for them to pay for it.

There a number of guides on disabling this. That being said you still need to bring the SD card to doctor every 6 months for review. This is a good thing. The doctor is trying to help you. I know someone that died because they went on a trip and forgot their CPAP and just stopped breathing in the middle of the night and did not wake up. It happens. When you get a CPAP there is a reason. Take it seriously.

If you are having issues because of physically fixable issues there are surgeries that can help (I had 2 things fixed). Most of the time however its just being fat and physical. Loosing the weight helps and the effect can be tracked in the data the CPAP collects. The doctor can then use the data to adjust then pressure down.

I am speaking from experience. My pressure setting has dropped as I took off the beer gut. This time next year I will likely be able to be done with it.

Ugh this is way worse and actually seems far more likely and easy to accomplish than the public wifi thing...

It's going to be time to crack the sucker open and burn out the traces to/from the modem, isn't it.

E: And in the ongoing arms war, then manufacturer's ship remotes that no longer use tried and true IR but instead go over the same bluetooth or 2.4ghz chip. Some probably already do, I would expect.

My new Panasonic TV has dual-mode remote control - IR+Bluetooth. Bluetooth means that you don't need to point the remote as accurately. Plus you can use a phone as remote control.

That's part of the push for 5G - the idea that it becomes much easier to have many more devices, hence you can drop a modem anywhere.

Jesus Christ, at that point I'd just go in the TV and snip a trace in it.

It won’t be long until we start taking a ddwrt approach and jtagging our tvs and replacing them with custom ROMs.

We’ll be okay for another 5-10 years before they securely start locking that down too.

I'm optimistic within 5-10 years we'll start to see the rise of open source tvs that'll save us. I have no sources to back this up but seeing the release of several open source laptops gives me hope.

See also Amazon Sidewalk.