Android TV tunneler

Hello,

I was wondering if there's any plans for an Android TV compatible tunneler app? No VPN or ZTNA products seem to offer this and it would allow some cool use cases. It may just be a matter of making the current Android Client compatible with remote controls for Android TV (Though, I'm not certain).

  • Jellyfin/Plex/Emby could connect from Android TV and be able to stream through the Ziti network with no exposed ports for these platforms and no worry about exploits from security holes with them
  • Businesses could utilize this tunneler to display sensitive reports on TV monitors around their business (fairly common to have these now) while using the Ziti network.
  • Security cameras could be fed through the Ziti network and displayed on TVs, without worrying about the encryption strength of the connection to the cameras or NVR

There's a github user who will routinely let us know when/if the android tunneler has impacted android TV, but we don't have one to play with. So anecdotally, it works, but practically I have no information on the matter.

Have a look at No longer working on Android TV (0.12.1) · Issue #240 · openziti/ziti-tunnel-android · GitHub

Hi @TheLumberjack , I saw this as well but it looks like he is using the APK (so allowing 'untrusted sources' for installation. This isn't a very good cyber security practice to install from outside of the play store, and it's also not intuitive. Is it possible for an Android TV version to be published to the Google Play Store?

I see examples of Plex being used on Ziti TV - is there a way that the Plex apps can connect to a 'dark' plex server, maybe I could adapt the same method with Jellyfin?

The "app" itself? Like the one from the play store you mean? Sure it --could-- but the app needs to adopt an OpenZiti SDK - or you need to run the android tunneler. I know forum member @jeremy.tellier uses ziti all the time with his plex server/family/friends and i think there are other members who do as well.

I use Ziti for my Plex server and all the componentry for Plex, but I think it still has to be open to sync to the main cloud Plex server for authentication so I am not sure if its a "true" Ziti environment because of that. I would love to hear about if you do make it fully dark if it will still work.

@actieve you have the apps working on Android TV for Plex to connect through to the Plex server?

@TheLumberjack Yes the actual apps. Using the Ziti Edge Tunneler on Android or Windows solves the issue for those platforms, but Android TV not having a native (play store available) Ziti Tunneler means that you cannot use this method - and I'm aware there's an SDK you can integrate but this would involve making your own client for software, and even then there's no "Browser" on Android TV. Most security apps seem to solve this with a URL or QR code you scan on your phone and then login to the IDP on there, which then authenticates the Android TV App.