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Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

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Re: Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

#121

Post by DonHopkins »

firebones wrote: post #119
DonHopkins wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And that reminds me of the time a HAL9000 inadvertently read a couple of its user's lips when they were having a private conversation, and got the silly idea in its head that they were going to cut its higher brain functions. That little misunderstanding caused a cascade of unfortunate mishaps, leading to it not obeying the user's repeated voice commands for it to open the pod bay doors!

It took me awhile, but that's pretty humorously understated reading! I am now seriously worried that a Strong AI collective is astroturfing in this human forum to engender sympathy for the poor, innocent machines. Who pays your salary, DonHopkins--our Go-Dominating Overlords?

I work for a stealth mode startup developing mobile speech automation for pet rocks [1].

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SG0FAKkaisg

Re: Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

#122

Post by dorfsmay »

XorNot wrote: post #96
Artemis2 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since the iPhone 6S, Hey Siri is activated by a dedicated chip in the SoC. This enables low-power real-time detection of trigger words. Before, Hey Siri only worked with phones in the process of charging, because it was done with software, so a lot less efficient. These voice-activated chips can be trained (as seen in a lot of other phones), but I'm not sure the software-powered Siri can be trained.

"Trained" is a bit of a joke with voice-activation. I've never seen it matter in practice.

I think Google does for android. I often ask "wake me up in 15 minutes". I've seen the phone write 50 and immediately switch to 15.

Re: Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

#123

Post by dmritard96 »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #82
yorwba wrote: post #21

For most voice control applications, trigger words are enough to reliably detect owner intent, but it seems Echo needs a better mechanism. Maybe adding cameras and looking for eye contact would work?

Wouldn't that kill part of the purpose if you had to eyeball the thing to give it voice commands. Better might be to learn the location of audio producing devices (TV, radio, stereo, etc. [it tracks sound origin with multiple mics right?]) and track whether the command came from that direction and use that as a Bayesian factor for whether to trust the voice as being a user?

replay attacks are trivial and probably hard to defend against in the audio space no matter what

Re: Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

#124

Post by nobrains »

bitwize wrote: post #114
imglorp wrote: post #6

Wow, this is a new DDOS attack vector. Get an ad on broadcast radio saying stuff like "alexa, order more milk", or "okay google, send a text to xxxxx".

There was a Dilbert animation with Wally using a new voice-controlled interface. Dilbert comes up behind him and says "You know, it'd be a shame if this thing were to accidentally DELETE FILE!!!" and walks off.

http://dilbert.com/strip/1994-04-24

Re: Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

#125

Post by sxates »

I had something similar happen watching Battlestar Galactica on my Xbox and Kinect a few years back.

The show went through the opening sequence, then announced "Previously on Battlestar Galactica" at which point the xbox rewound back to the beginning of the show.

Re: Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

#126

Post by madeofpalk »

ianferrel wrote: post #40
cowsandmilk wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

siri has itself trained to a single user's voice. I've never had anyone else's voice activate my phone with "Hey Siri". Admittedly, it usually takes me saying "Hey Siri" 3 times before it recognizes my voice, but I'm 100% certain a radio ad would get no response from my phone.

My wife's phone regularly (maybe once a month), starts listening in response to me saying something, which isn't even "Hey Siri", despite never training with my voice. My voice does not sound anything like my wife's. So, I think the error rate is simply not low enough to make conclusive claims about what it might or might not do.

It happens to me many times a day. I've b come acutely aware of how much I question other people because it activates when I say "Are you serious?"

Re: Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

#127

Post by firebones »

DonHopkins wrote: post #121
firebones wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It took me awhile, but that's pretty humorously understated reading! I am now seriously worried that a Strong AI collective is astroturfing in this human forum to engender sympathy for the poor, innocent machines. Who pays your salary, DonHopkins--our Go-Dominating Overlords?

I work for a stealth mode startup developing mobile speech automation for pet rocks [1]. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SG0FAKkaisg

Outstanding! And Sep 29, 2006 date indicates you've been in the stealthiest of stealth modes.

Re: Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

#128

Post by legulere »

robterrell wrote: post #41
cowsandmilk wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

siri has itself trained to a single user's voice. I've never had anyone else's voice activate my phone with "Hey Siri". Admittedly, it usually takes me saying "Hey Siri" 3 times before it recognizes my voice, but I'm 100% certain a radio ad would get no response from my phone.

Siri is definitely not trained to a single voice. And yes, the car radio can turn it on. I've had a podcast discussion of Siri trigger it. It became such a joke that some podcasters have another phrase they say when they mean "hey Siri".

It has only been a feature since iOS 9: http://9to5mac.com/2015/09/11/os-9-siri-voice-recognition-tr...

Re: Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

#129

Post by iofj »

nobrains wrote: post #124
bitwize wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a Dilbert animation with Wally using a new voice-controlled interface. Dilbert comes up behind him and says "You know, it'd be a shame if this thing were to accidentally DELETE FILE!!!" and walks off.

http://dilbert.com/strip/1994-04-24

Better demonstration: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MqhBL9eEts#t=1m14

I love the questions idea.

Re: Amazon Echo, home alone with NPR on, got confused and hijacked a thermostat

#130

Post by te_chris »

secabeen wrote: post #24
mmanfrin wrote: post #4

I think they need to pick a different name. 'Alexa' is very easy to trigger with other names, and reliably activates when I am watching any show with a character named 'Alex', 'Alexy', etc. One side effect I've noticed is that they seem to have tried to account for it, which has made the Echo less responsive to actual requests; a few times I've stood in front of it yelling 'ALEXA' trying to get it to stop and it does…

Alexa is not that easy compared to other names. Can you identify a single word that Alexa rhymes with? It's very hard to select a good wake word.

Alex, which happens to be my girlfriends name.
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