Finding Public IP Address of Cable Modem serving the SmartTV?

My TV was stolen last week. I had just gotten it this month and I’m still discovering security features for the TV that could help. I did set up the TV in the smartthings app. Right now I can see that TV is on and the user is watching Netflix. Is there any way I can find the public ip address that my TV is connecting through to report to police?

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If it were me, I’d file a police report with the serial # of the TV in question then contact Samsung support with a copy of that police report and ask them to help and see what they say. Don’t be suprised if they say they can’t help you without a warrant.

I would report that fact to the law enforcement agency that you filed the stolen report with. Even if you could somehow find that public IP address, you would only be able to trace it to the ISP. It would take a subpoena or court order (at least in the US) to find the identity of the subscriber from the ISP.

I’ve filed a police report and my intention would be to turn over the IP and ISP to law enforcement so they could get a warrant and call the ISP for the account and go from there. Its a long shot, but something to do with my time. If I just let them know that I can still connect to the TV through smartthings, I’m don’t think they would be interested.

I would also mess with them by turning the TV on and off and changing channels. Make them think they got a dud :slight_smile:

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My guess would be that law enforcement could get the IP from Netflix. It is sometimes easier to get the IP from something connected to, as opposed to figuring out the IP of the connected device itself. Netflix is probably not going to talk to you, as firms like them are accustomed to being provided a subpoena/court order.

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If you can see that they are watching netflix, are they watching on your account? or their own? If they are using your account, you can go to netflix to get the IP address. If you go to Netflix and open up your “my account” page, you can go to “Recent Streaming Activity”. You can then see the IP address of the device that is streaming.

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Get on a pc, and run tracert.

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They aren’t watching on my Netflix account. I changed the password and forced a re-login immediately. Where would you suggest I run the trace route to? The problem is that smartthings doesn’t seem to expose the ip address. My best guess is a programmatic way in the IDE that might add a device handler to my app, but its a bit above my head. I haven’t had a tv in 5 years and I owned this one for a few weeks. I didn’t get a chance to really explore all the options available while working 10 hours a day through Christmas.

Ouch! I’m really sorry to hear that. :rage:

This forum was originally set up so that customers using the hub could help each other.

Samsung has a different forum for television owners which has employee helpers in it. You might try that one also, as they can often give you much more detailed information about the televisions and appliances.

https://us.community.samsung.com/t5/TVs/ct-p/TVs

If they are dumb enough to use your Netflix account, they are not smart enough to use VPNs to make their IP Address untraceable. (Most criminals are dumb.) Let them use your Netflix until Netflix or Samsung can get you the public IP they are using, and then have that IP’s ISP trace it down to location…then the cops can pick up your TV, and hopefully the individuals that were using said televisions.

Believe it or not, stuff like this will help curb theft because if these things are traceable, then their value as far as stolen goods becomes nothing.

Your TV basically has a kind of Lo-jack.

Problem is that I already change the Netflix password and forced a relogin. They never had a chance to use it. I checked Netflix history and no one has been in since I changed the password. I’m in the other Samsung forum now. hopefully they can do something.

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Unfortunately you apparently didn’t get one of the dumb ones. At least they were “considerate” enough not to use your account! :joy:

Where do you live?

Police and/or investigator - prosecutors in San Francisco would laugh in my face if anyone presented this sort of scenario. They have zero interest in solving property theft crimes.

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St. Louis City, unfortunately, is the same. They don’t care about crime. That is why we win most dangerous city every year.

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Yea, the cop that showed up didn’t exactly make me feel like they were going to do a single thing beyond filing paperwork.

Its the unfortunate truth… I had a similar event with the police in California about someone about to walk into a Best Buy to pick up a high end computer that they so kindly paid for with my credit card and my Best Buy account. (Thank you purchase alerts)

That said, after being on the customer support side of things for many years for a Fortune 10 tech company, I would be suprised if Samsung does not already have written policy to NOT provide that information unless you have a police report AND a warrant for the information, even if you are the proven owner of the device.

(Insert long dissertation about consumer privacy here - trust me, you want these policies in place, more stories of bad behavior here)

At this point, you’re probably better off deleting the set from your ST account, forgetting about it and working out the best deal you can with your insurance company. It sucks, but probably will get you the best result.

That’s probably good advice. I actually don’t need the IP address. I just need to know if its possible and get a contact. Then I can forward it to the police for them to deal with.

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If your Police actually “deal with it”, please let me know where you live - I want to move there.

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Yep. Interestingly, you also cannot just “take back” what has been stolen from you. Especially if you use force in the process. I found this out the hard way. One of my racing bikes was stolen from me. The thief was stupid. The bike had no saddle, so he took it to the local shop to get one… within hours of having taken it from me. The owner of the shop recognized what he thought might be my bike, and called me… I was waiting outside the store when the thief emerged with the bike. He saw what was about to happen to him, and tried to run… which was the sign that he was indeed the thief.

But because I couldn’t prove that - and the police would not come to my home to check my story because they arrested me and not the thief - I was the one charged with aggravated assault.

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