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Ask HN: Does your Amazon Echo talk to you without being asked?

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Re: Ask HN: Does your Amazon Echo talk to you without being asked?

#11

Post by jakestein »

Yes, although not when things are silent. Once every week or two the Echo misinterprets something as a command and breaks into our conversation with a seemingly out of nowhere response.

Sometimes it's funny, sometimes it's annoying. I can't recall ever having this issue with "Hey Siri" and I don't own a Google Home

Re: Ask HN: Does your Amazon Echo talk to you without being asked?

#12

Post by criddell »

No, ours doesn't do that, but it doesn't something equally stupid.

I think our ISP does upgrades and network changes in the middle of the night and sometimes our gateway is rebooted. For some reason, the Echo feels the need to loudly proclaim that it can't connect with the mothership even though it's 4 am and we've never once used it at that time.

It wakes us up with "HOLY SHIT I CAN'T SEE THE FUCKING INTERNET!1@!@!". Those aren't the exact words, but when you are startled awake at 4am that's what it sounds like.

Re: Ask HN: Does your Amazon Echo talk to you without being asked?

#13

Post by zippergz »

I've never had this exact situation, but ours starts talking in response to unrelated things we've said, stuff on the tv, or even random sounds in the house (e.g. a book being dropped set it off once) several times a week. I've been getting tempted to unplug it.

Re: Ask HN: Does your Amazon Echo talk to you without being asked?

#15

Post by davelnewton »

criddell wrote: post #12

No, ours doesn't do that, but it doesn't something equally stupid. I think our ISP does upgrades and network changes in the middle of the night and sometimes our gateway is rebooted. For some reason, the Echo feels the need to loudly proclaim that it can't connect with the mothership even though it's 4 am and we've never once used it at that time. It wakes us up with "HOLY SHIT I CAN'T SEE THE FUCKING INTERNET!1@!@!"…

Yeah, it's kind of annoying.

And the screen really wants to be on despite me turning it off. IMO once I turn it off it should stay off until I tell it to go back on, or I touch it, or something. I'm light-sensitive when I sleep and really don't want it on until I tell it to be on >:|

Re: Ask HN: Does your Amazon Echo talk to you without being asked?

#16

Post by globeadue »

Command words don't rull full analytics I would think. My command word "Computer" on my echo is triggered by unrelated words that in hindsight have the same inflections etc or high match %. A lot time while listening to music softly I it triggers and I hear it volume down. I can regular play with my dog and say things like get the ball or some such and get it to trigger.

Re: Ask HN: Does your Amazon Echo talk to you without being asked?

#17

Post by leonroy »

n1000 wrote: post #4
akhilcacharya wrote: post #2

That has definitely not happened to me, but I can't wait until a horror film decides to use a possessed Echo as a plot device.

your wait is over: https://youtu.be/J9gUIhkzNDk @OP: Better don‘t watch ;)

heheh, that was well worth watching!

There was an awful case about three years ago where some guy hacked into a baby video monitor and started yelling at the 10 month old child: http://time.com/79170/stranger-hacks-into-baby-monitor-and-s...

I think as IoT spreads we're going to be seeing some real life horror stories unfortunately. These devices are just barely secure at the best of times and I don't think their network stacks are anywhere near tight enough.

Re: Ask HN: Does your Amazon Echo talk to you without being asked?

#18

Post by dsnuh »

This is slightly OT, but a great prank is to use the 'say' application on OS X (there is a ladies' voice option that sounds very similar to Alexa but the name evades me) and hook up the Alexa as a BT speaker.

You can also use a sleep before the say command so that you can be away from the computer and have deniability. I did this to my family last April Fool's Day and it was hilarious.

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