Are Nielsen surveys still a thing? Every single device that displays a video signal to you has been tracking what you watch since way before ad tech became a thing. The companies collecting that data then profit from that collection.
As an anecdote, I have AT&T Gigaverse. I primarily only watch recorded material on the DVR, and only watch sporting events live. However, once I'm done watching a signal from my "cable box", I switch it over to my external media device on a different input on my TV. The cable box stays on whatever that channel it was on for however long it takes before the cable box goes into screen saver. Someone is getting skewed ad view counts by 1 as my cable box displayed it but nobody saw it.
As an anecdote, I have AT&T Gigaverse. I primarily only watch recorded material on the DVR, and only watch sporting events live. However, once I'm done watching a signal from my "cable box", I switch it over to my external media device on a different input on my TV. The cable box stays on whatever that channel it was on for however long it takes before the cable box goes into screen saver. Someone is getting skewed ad view counts by 1 as my cable box displayed it but nobody saw it.