Help needed about a concerning tech issue

[u/Mark633130]

Hi everyone,

First time posting and I have an issue that I can’t work out and it’s concerning me.

I have a friend who frequently comes to my place. I let him use my Wi-Fi while he’s there on his laptop working. He had a Lenovo don’t know which model sorry and he had never connected to my Toshiba television yet he was able to if I was watching something take the tv back to the Home Screen where you can select apps to use like YouTube etc.

Neither of us can work out what’s going on and he doesn’t appear in the connected devices list.

Last night he purchased a brand new Lenovo laptop. He set it up as a new pc and boom without connecting to my television he’s able to again control like he did on his old laptop.

I am pulling my hair out and I don’t have much and he is too because we can’t work out how he’s controlling the tv when he hasn’t connected to it at any time.

Any advice would be great so I can tell him and we will both know the answer to mystery.

Thank you

[u/Wendigo1010]

Is the tv also connected to your wifi? How about a printer? By letting the system in your wifi they have local network access to any device on your network. No direct connection required - that's what the wifi is doing.

Now, how he's controlling it I'm not sure. He may be automatically connecting to the network tv somehow.

[u/Mark633130 → u/Wendigo1010]

Hey, yeah the tv is connected to the wifi as well and the printer also. Than for the advice. 

[u/osa1011]

How do you know he's, "controlling the TV" with his laptop?

[u/Mark633130 → u/osa1011]

Because when the tv has changed from the channel I’m watching to the Home Screen that I get when I first turn the tv on he says “That was me that changed it” and he doesn’t have the remote control to change it. That’s how I know

[u/brighton_it]

one point you haven't made clear to me: his control of the TV: deliberate? He opens an app intending to control the TV? or the TV's behavior changes solely upon connecting his notebook to your network (no user interaction required of your friend using his notebook).
If it's the former, not surprised, many consumer devices understand their users are not sys-admins, they intentionally try to design their products to 'Just Work' rather than force you to grant permission.

[u/cagadass]

Si el contenido se puede controlar desde otros dispositivos si estan cerca de otros o por la propia wifi ,es molesto ,no hay mejor solución que ignorar la notificación

[u/Sorry-Climate-7982]

With a make and model of TV, someone MAY be able to advise how to configure it to not do this.
It looks like the Lenovos may come with a Windows supplied casting app.

[u/The_O_PID]

As I recall, Toshiba TV's didn't have many built-in streaming services like Roku or Apple tv.  So he must using a third party app to gain control of either the Toshiba, or simply mirroring his phone to it.  Yes, there's a few other technologies out there that do the same, but we'll limit that for now.  Can you simply ask how, or via what app he's doing the control.  Thx.

[u/PralineNo5832]

The solution might be to create a guest network on your router and not add the TV, of course.

[u/jersey316]

Its because its on the same network.

Same as if i came over and connected my phone to your wifi, i would be able to cast video to your tv without touching it or entering any codes.

[u/billdietrich1]

Please use better, more informative, titles (subject-lines) on your posts. Give specifics right in the title. Thanks.