this post was submitted on 21 Nov 2023
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Plex crossed a line with "Your week in review" emails today. (alien.top)
submitted 11 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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As you may have seen Plex decided it was OK today to send an email showing me what my friends have been watching. To be clear, this is Plex telling other people what I've been watching from my server, with my files, and this is not OK.

https://imgur.com/a/DYR4wlh

We all knew it was a matter of time before Plex started collecting data on our libraries and sharing it with advertisers. What happened to their "we don't know, and don't want to know, what is on your server"?. This, for me, is proof that those fears were absolutely founded in reality. On what planet would I ever want this information to be shared with friends on family on an OPT OUT basis?

It's totally unacceptable to collect this data in the first place. It's totally unacceptable to share this information with uniquely identifiable information. And it's totally unacceptable to do this without explicitly asking me if it's OK.

Unfortunately there is nothing you can do about this as a server admin, because technically these are Plex users and their marketing email preferences are controlled on the user side in the Plex website preferences. Not on your server.

This is an absolutely egregious overreach.

Thank goodness there are alternatives available in the form of Jellyfin and Emby. I left my Plex server up after the Jellyfin January challenge we did on the Self-Hosted podcast but because of this I feel that I have no choice but to take it down for good.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago (5 children)

You can set it in your profile settings

https://imgur.com/a/Xp9LwqI

But it's worrying if it's opt-out and not opt-in - even if they did prompt me to look at it when I first logged in after the added the Friends Discovery thing. Although the disclaimer suggests that for US users at least it might be opt-in, I honestly don't remember what the default was for me.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

the fuck?

it's a media server. Why do I want 'friends' involved at all?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

This here. This setting is absolutely controllable and if memory serves me right i had to enable it when the feature rolled out. In fact, I just made a brand new account and after signing in the very first option is to either accept or change the setting.

https://i.imgur.com/8rvyjOt.png

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

Yup. The feature smacks you in the face.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I assume this stuff is US only at the mo' because I can't see those settings at all.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

UK here and I can see it

exegamer76's comment above gives the link

It seems to be the following:

Go to https://app.plex.tv/desktop/#!/profile/edit

Click on "Privacy Settings" at the bottom of the page

Dialog from the screenshot pops up

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Thanks for sharing this. How do I get to the settings page you showed in the screenshot?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (2 children)

It seems to be the following:

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

Thank you good Sir!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

Thank you. That looks like it. Here's what it looks like:

https://imgur.com/a/vRvUWxv

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

Ahh, thanks!