We have had no interest in getting Amazon’s Alexa or any smart gadgets that respond to our voice commands — we figured they could be listening all the time, and who needs that?
It turns out our caution is well-founded.
Would you let a stranger eavesdrop in your home and keep the recordings? For most people, the answer is, “Are you crazy?”
Yet that’s essentially what Amazon has been doing to millions of us with its assistant Alexa in microphone-equipped Echo speakers. And it’s hardly alone: Bugging our homes is Silicon Valley’s next frontier.
—Alexa has been eavesdropping on you this whole time
Apparently Amazon does let you see what recordings it has saved, times when Alexa has woken up when you didn’t want it to, and the author of the article says some of the information it stored about his family should have remained private.
Apple’s Siri also stores recordings, and other smart home devices save a lot of information about people’s habits.
The situation reminds me of the old saying,
Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean people aren’t chasing you with knives.
Have you ever used any of these devices or are you as happily old fashioned as we are?
May 6, 2019
I see the device here, recording all kinds of things…i.e. last week gmail started referencing a portable phone type I bought…it took me a bit of thinking before I remembered the guy at the chain store asking me my phone number…looking it up and saying “you’ve not Craig O…?” I then had to think about how that guy (whom I knew) had that number and recorded at that chain store…yes he was originator of this phone number and he obviously bought our then phone from this chain…the guy changed the infomation…SO then it’s on a database that connected the dots together on this here advertising space….
and then there is the online shopping, some times it will come up with product that I don’t normally buy online, but rather I frequent a small localised chain of theirs when I need certain things. And there it is online asking me “did you forget…” it’s the “card thing” in this instance…
so in many ways “it’s everywhere nowadays”….
Yes, they know about us and what we like. Sometimes it can be useful, but….
I’ve used the Siri feature on our iPhones on occasion, but have disabled that feature. For a while, we had the capability to control our heating and air conditioning with our phones, but, after an unrelated glitch with our wifi, never set it back up.
I’m not very interested in the internet of things, having devices in our home connected via wifi. Most of it doesn’t make much sense to me. One exception might be a home security system, but living in the country, it’s not much of a concern. (We never lock our vehicles out here and probably could get away with not locking the house, though we got in the habit over 30 years ago when our girls were still at home to lock the doors at night and when we’re away.)
So, something like Alexa…. not going to happen in this house.
I agree. there wouldn’t be that much value added for us.. But Andy’s brother-in-law did use Siri to find the restaurant we ate at when he and Andy’s sister were here, and that worked fine. And Kaitlin and Torben use Siri some (a lot?), I think.
Not using those devices in this house and agree that the Internet of things is not appealing. I lost trust in much of how the tech world chooses to function years ago. As If commercialism isn’t enough of a concern, I find other very worrisome issues, especially with the way our government is going.
Yes, the government. Not just here but in a lot of other places in the world. Apparently China is going great guns on surveillance AI and is happy to sell its technology to anyone who wants it. Authoritarianism is thriving now.
I don’t use Alexa and I doubt I ever will.
We’re with you. 🙂
I have Alexa on my Kindle but it’s not voice activated. I have push a button plus have the Kindle turned on to ask it questions. I use it mostly to spell or define words for me. I will never upgrade to a voice activated system unless I’m bed ridden or severely disabled. For that segment of society they could a really valuable asset, but so far I don’t see any marketing aimed in their direction. And I would hate those refrigerators that keep track of the food you buy, their expiration dates and will automatically place reorders.
Yes, one needs to be careful not to let them do too much. Apparently some parents had trouble with their kids ordering things from Amazon. 😀
i’m flabbergasted! I knew I was a dinosaur but I had no idea about some of the things Alexa and her cohorts (the nosy refrigerator for example) do! and to have someone in my home listening to my every word? what is going on?
WHY do we allow this? are we THAT much into marketing and retail and information gathering? it’s enough to buy a book on kindle (which I do enjoy) and then have amazon send me reams of suggestions based on the book I just bought! I never liked a clerk following me around in a store holding out suggestions for me to buy and I don’t like their same internet tactics now.
it drives the minimalist in me to even be more alert. how easy we are ‘sucked in’ for the ‘convenience’ of it! and there I thought Alexa might just be for playing lovely music when you want it to! WOW. wake up tammy!
thanks for this post Monk and all the great commenters. xoxo
Enough people like to for it to be profitable. Don’t forget these old folks: