

5·
1 day agoI think it’s far more common for devices to get pairing wrong than to get it right.
Just a few of the very common issues I’ve seen in various devices:
- TVs that are constantly in discoverable mode, even when the screen is off. Just in case the owner loses their remote and wants to pair a new one without reaching behind the TV to press a button. No way of avoiding this except disabling Bluetooth entirely, which makes the stock remote lose either partial or all functionality. Pairing requests also interrupt whatever you’re watching.
- Audio devices that have a very short delay after turning on and waiting for any already-paired devices to connect before switching over to a pairing mode instead. So short that a smartphone in a low-power state (e.g. because you haven’t unlocked it for a few minutes) might not connect in time. Most if not all of the bluetooth-to-3.5mm receivers intended for older cars seem to share this problem.
- Pairing codes are extremely underused in general, even among input devices. Most things seem to just pair with whoever sends a request first unconditionally.
My experience is mostly with Sony TVs, which run near-stock Android TV and do have a settings toggle to disable Bluetooth without needing root. Some models need BT for voice search (if mic is in the remote), and to many people losing that might be a good thing, but others seem to need it for basic menu navigation from the stock remote because odd features like trackpad don’t blast through IR. Considering how often I see unfamiliar TVs listed when I look at my phone’s Bluetooth pairing menu, I knew plenty of other TV vendors use constant discoverable mode.
Having strangers within wireless range (especially for 2.4 GHz, but 5 GHz can be bad too) be able to intentionally and/or repeatedly interrupt what you’re doing with a pairing request at any time absolutely should be seen as a severe security flaw in my eyes. Even if they can’t successfully pair, the request prompt is akin to denial-of-service. Being such a blatant flaw that people often do it by mistake is even worse.