Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Siri records fights, doctor’s appointments, and sex, and contractors hear it

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 131 posts

Re: Siri records fights, doctor’s appointments, and sex, and contractors hear it

#11

Post by Buge »

zaroth wrote: post #5
romwell wrote: post #2

> “These recordings are accompanied by user data showing location, contact details, and app data.” This should be in the title. Media was focusing on contractors listening to Google Assistant snippets not long ago — and those were anonymized . Private and identifying information was in the snippets, not metadata (the article mentioned this).

I think the story is possibly confusing this bit. When recorded, and transmitted to Apple, the location, Apple ID, etc. of the recording device is known. The same (similar) would be true for any voice assistant. When the contractors are reviewing snippets for training purposes, this data is anonymized. In the case of Apple; > Apple has said that it takes steps to protect users from being connected with the recordings…

It's a direct quote from the whistleblower:

> The whistleblower said: “There have been countless instances of recordings featuring private discussions between doctors and patients, business deals, seemingly criminal dealings, sexual encounters and so on. These recordings are accompanied by user data showing location, contact details, and app data.”

> That accompanying information may be used to verify whether a request was successfully dealt with. In its privacy documents, Apple says the Siri data “is not linked to other data that Apple may have from your use of other Apple services”. There is no specific name or identifier attached to a record and no individual recording can be easily linked to other recordings.

> Apple told the Guardian: “A small portion of Siri requests are analysed to improve Siri and dictation. User requests are not associated with the user’s Apple ID. Siri responses are analysed in secure facilities and all reviewers are under the obligation to adhere to Apple’s strict confidentiality requirements.”

Strangely, the whistleblower's quote directly contradicts Apple's privacy documents. The whistleblower says the recordings are linked to some other information, but the privacy documents say the recordings are not linked to other information.

But the whistleblower's quote does not contradict Apple's quote to the Guardian. The whistleblower never says the recordings are linked to the user's Apple ID.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/jul/26/apple-con...

Re: Siri records fights, doctor’s appointments, and sex, and contractors hear it

#12

Post by [deleted] »

Buge wrote: post #11
zaroth wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the story is possibly confusing this bit. When recorded, and transmitted to Apple, the location, Apple ID, etc. of the recording device is known. The same (similar) would be true for any voice assistant. When the contractors are reviewing snippets for training purposes, this data is anonymized. In the case of Apple; > Apple has said that it takes steps to protect users from being connected with the recordings…

It's a direct quote from the whistleblower: > The whistleblower said: “There have been countless instances of recordings featuring private discussions between doctors and patients, business deals, seemingly criminal dealings, sexual encounters and so on. These recordings are accompanied by user data showing location, contact details, and app data.” > That accompanying information may be used to verify whether a reque…

[deleted]

Re: Siri records fights, doctor’s appointments, and sex, and contractors hear it

#14

Post by bestnameever »

rgovostes wrote: post #4

Apple has extensively annotated iOS with understandable information about how data is used. The user has the ability to review this info when they enable Hey Siri, or any time in the Siri & Search settings. It lists the data that is sent to Apple when you activate Siri. Personally, I’ve only ever seen Hey Siri falsely activate once, from something a character on TV said. (I could get Ok, Google to trigger on a friend…

I've seen Siri activate in error on at least two different phones this week. Not uncommon at all.

Re: Siri records fights, doctor’s appointments, and sex, and contractors hear it

#15

Post by identity0 »

droithomme wrote: post #8

If Siri reviewers encounter evidence of certain crimes such as murder, sex trafficking, pedophilia, or domestic abuse, it is obvious they have a basic moral duty to report the crime and turn over the evidence to investigators.

I disagree. There's a reason that evidence obtained illegally by the police can't be admitted in court, even if it proves some horrible crime. IMO the fair use of the law for the whole population is far more important than stopping one criminal.

Re: Siri records fights, doctor’s appointments, and sex, and contractors hear it

#16

Post by vatueil »

zaroth wrote: post #5
romwell wrote: post #2

> “These recordings are accompanied by user data showing location, contact details, and app data.” This should be in the title. Media was focusing on contractors listening to Google Assistant snippets not long ago — and those were anonymized . Private and identifying information was in the snippets, not metadata (the article mentioned this).

I think the story is possibly confusing this bit. When recorded, and transmitted to Apple, the location, Apple ID, etc. of the recording device is known. The same (similar) would be true for any voice assistant. When the contractors are reviewing snippets for training purposes, this data is anonymized. In the case of Apple; > Apple has said that it takes steps to protect users from being connected with the recordings…

> When recorded, and transmitted to Apple, the location, Apple ID, etc. of the recording device is known.

Actually, according to Apple's statements Siri does not link recordings to your Apple ID.

That's a bit of a double-edged sword, though, since it means users cannot easily check what Apple has recorded either. Judging from public reactions, it seems many users think Apple doesn't keep Siri records at all simply because they can't access the audio history.

Reportedly, the only way to avoid letting Apple manually review audio was to not use Siri at all, unlike other voice assistants. If so, I wonder if that was also due to the lack of Apple ID, since if audio isn't linked to a user then it follows that it isn't linked to user preferences either.

I suppose you could still do something like send data from users that allow QA testing to one system and from those that opt-out to another, but apparently that wasn't done.

Re: Siri records fights, doctor’s appointments, and sex, and contractors hear it

#17

Post by novok »

droithomme wrote: post #8

If Siri reviewers encounter evidence of certain crimes such as murder, sex trafficking, pedophilia, or domestic abuse, it is obvious they have a basic moral duty to report the crime and turn over the evidence to investigators.

Thats the burn a forest to kill a few rabid dogs argument.

Re: Siri records fights, doctor’s appointments, and sex, and contractors hear it

#18

Post by Iv »

identity0 wrote: post #15
droithomme wrote: post #8

If Siri reviewers encounter evidence of certain crimes such as murder, sex trafficking, pedophilia, or domestic abuse, it is obvious they have a basic moral duty to report the crime and turn over the evidence to investigators.

I disagree. There's a reason that evidence obtained illegally by the police can't be admitted in court, even if it proves some horrible crime. IMO the fair use of the law for the whole population is far more important than stopping one criminal.

"by the police"

In this case it is not the police who obtained it.

I think in some countries, not reporting crimes you know about could count as complicity.

Re: Siri records fights, doctor’s appointments, and sex, and contractors hear it

#19

Post by ocdtrekkie »

romwell wrote: post #2

> “These recordings are accompanied by user data showing location, contact details, and app data.” This should be in the title. Media was focusing on contractors listening to Google Assistant snippets not long ago — and those were anonymized . Private and identifying information was in the snippets, not metadata (the article mentioned this).

Note that while the Google recording data was arguably "anonymized", the reviewers of the leaked recordings were able to in many cases find enough personal information to contact the people recorded. Which means they were not, in fact, anonymized.

"We let ordinary Flemish people hear some of their own recordings. ‘This is undeniably my own voice’, says one man, clearly surprised."

"A couple from Waasmunster immediately recognise the voice of their son and their grandchild."

https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2019/07/10/google-employees-are...

Re: Siri records fights, doctor’s appointments, and sex, and contractors hear it

#20

Post by tshtf »

rgovostes wrote: post #4

Apple has extensively annotated iOS with understandable information about how data is used. The user has the ability to review this info when they enable Hey Siri, or any time in the Siri & Search settings. It lists the data that is sent to Apple when you activate Siri. Personally, I’ve only ever seen Hey Siri falsely activate once, from something a character on TV said. (I could get Ok, Google to trigger on a friend…

I once asked Siri "What city am I in?", to which she responded "Calling Ian." This was around 5am. I promptly disabled Siri and never looked back.
Post reply on HN