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I'll never forget how confused I was when my HP printer kept printing ads, randomly.

Turns out, it was an official practice by HP.

I'll never use any of their products again.

That sounds like pure horror to me. I haven't heard of this before. Can you provide a source to back this claim?

I hadn’t heard of this before either. A quick search (miraculously, Google still sometimes works for me) indicates two separate phenomena: one is that HP did intend to insert printed ads when you use some of their automated print options (https://www.computerworld.com/article/2519039/hp-partners-wi...), and the other is that some HP printers are “web-enabled” in the sense that emails to a certain printer email address will automatically be printed, and the default access settings allow spam ads which then get automatically printed (https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Mobile-Printing-Cloud-Printing...)

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