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Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

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Re: Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

#141

Post by CobrastanJorji »

pixxel wrote: post #118
cheeze wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. Amazon seems to actually care about privacy and takes things like this pretty seriously. One could certainly criticize AMZN data collection, but I think Amazon has shown that it does care about privacy of this data. Mistakes do happen which is unfortunate, and I think there is a good argument for no company, no matter their intentions to record this much data. On the other hand, this is Facebook's busines…

“Amazon seems to actually care about privacy “ Not according to the NY Times this week. Amazon have been reading your private messages on Facebook. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/18/technology/facebook-priva...

y'know, I never thought about it, but I think I agree with you that being willing to pay another company for access to private information about you probably counts as not caring about your privacy.

It's not as bad. It's the difference between paying somebody to tell them secrets about you and selling secrets about you. But it's definitely not a thing a person respectful of your privacy would do.

Re: Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

#142

Post by iforgotpassword »

rdtsc wrote: post #17

I am baffled by how many people have no problems adding always listening and recording Google and Facebook devices to their living rooms. Some are considered tech people who should know stuff like this could happen, but they just don't care or don't think it will happen to them. Somewhere there is an ex-Stasi officer who is thinking "I wish we were that good and had people fooled to voluntarily install listening devi…

> Some are considered tech people who should know stuff like this could happen, but they just don't care or don't think it will happen to them.

It's this thing where you somehow believe that just by being an expert in some field, bad things in this very field can't happen to you, even if it's out of your control. Like a brain surgeon suddenly getting a tumor in his own brain.

Re: Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

#143

Post by andrei_says_ »

bena wrote: post #126
mcny wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What I don't understand is why they have to store voice recordings instead of deleting them once they understand the vocal command. There could be a number of reasons and I don't like any of them. Not that I have any insider information but a while back someone made a post on reddit about what baffles them about their work and they had a job where they basically listened to very short voice clips and saw something…

Are you trying to say these home assistants are basically mechanical Turks?

Most likely the human verification is not in real time but for quality improvements after the facts.

In case you weren’t joking.

Re: Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

#144

Post by tgsovlerkhgsel »

closetohome wrote: post #26

I'm having trouble getting worked up about this one. Yeah a privacy breach happened, but it was only one person's data exposed, and only to one other person. The only reason it made the news is because people are already paranoid about voice assistants.

Was the data supposed to be stored in the first place according to the privacy policy/user consent? If not, it'd mean that Amazon stored highly sensitive data (audio recordings from people's bedrooms) illegally and in breach of user's trust.

Re: Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

#145

Post by tryagainacct »

pixxel wrote: post #118
cheeze wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. Amazon seems to actually care about privacy and takes things like this pretty seriously. One could certainly criticize AMZN data collection, but I think Amazon has shown that it does care about privacy of this data. Mistakes do happen which is unfortunate, and I think there is a good argument for no company, no matter their intentions to record this much data. On the other hand, this is Facebook's busines…

“Amazon seems to actually care about privacy “ Not according to the NY Times this week. Amazon have been reading your private messages on Facebook. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/18/technology/facebook-priva...

You might want to read the article again. No part of it says that Amazon read private messages on Facebook.

Re: Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

#146

Post by jetrink »

mcny wrote: post #108
pmontra wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can opt out of basically every Google login/tracking in Android, except the Play store. I know because I'm logged out of everything and I disable location services. Google Maps keeps working. What I don't understand is why they have to store voice recordings instead of deleting them once they understand the vocal command. There could be a number of reasons and I don't like any of them.

> What I don't understand is why they have to store voice recordings instead of deleting them once they understand the vocal command. There could be a number of reasons and I don't like any of them. Not that I have any insider information but a while back someone made a post on reddit about what baffles them about their work and they had a job where they basically listened to very short voice clips and saw something…

There are tons of phone systems that use speech recognition and warn you that you are being recorded for quality assurance purposes. I would assume those recordings come from that type of system. Google and Amazon have been clear that humans will not be listening to the recordings.

Re: Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

#147

Post by falcolas »

LinuxBender wrote: post #52
stevecalifornia wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) It's always listening for a keyword, and then it starts recording. It's a voice interface for a computer. 2) Your phone is doing the same thing except for it follows you around everywhere you go and records your map location, what apps you use, who you are talking to and what your web searches are. Your phone isn't recording just what you say...its recording what you do and where you do it and when you do it. It's…

1) Nobody can prove that. It's always listening and you have to assume always recording and transmitting. 2) My phone is a $12 throw away that speaks voice and sms (text). 3) Loose lips sink ships.

Actually, quite the contrary has been proven to point 1: both for Alexa (the spooky laugh episode) and Google Play (the "always pressed" button episode).

I almost think that the burden of proof that things aren't being sent is a valid expectation in this point. And that proof needs to be re-confirmed with each firmware update to ensure a bug hasn't caused the behavior to change.

Re: Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

#148

Post by alpaca128 »

eyjafjallajokul wrote: post #58
thfuran wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Voice-first devices are long overdue. Sure, that's not really anything that anyone disagrees with. It's the acceptance of data collection and exfiltration that is odd.

Maybe a naive question, but how are they any worse than having phones with non-transparent hardware/radio drivers in your living room? We seem to have accepted that risk, and even carry phones around everywhere.

We use smartphones for the same reason we don't avoid any non-free software like Stallman: a huge amount of additional possibilities. But what Alexa, Siri etc. offer is just a different way to use a limited set of existing features, in exchange for a much higher risk of a privacy breach.

Everyone needs to draw a line somewhere, I just don't see a reason to use voice assistants, definitely not with internet connectivity and where the company keeps all recordings for some reason.

Re: Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

#149

Post by setquk »

rdtsc wrote: post #17

I am baffled by how many people have no problems adding always listening and recording Google and Facebook devices to their living rooms. Some are considered tech people who should know stuff like this could happen, but they just don't care or don't think it will happen to them. Somewhere there is an ex-Stasi officer who is thinking "I wish we were that good and had people fooled to voluntarily install listening devi…

The stasi kept the data protected better than a lot of tech companies as well.

Re: Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

#150

Post by iforgotpassword »

oulipo wrote: post #94
rdtsc wrote: post #17

I am baffled by how many people have no problems adding always listening and recording Google and Facebook devices to their living rooms. Some are considered tech people who should know stuff like this could happen, but they just don't care or don't think it will happen to them. Somewhere there is an ex-Stasi officer who is thinking "I wish we were that good and had people fooled to voluntarily install listening devi…

This is exactly why we are building the first 100% on-device and private-by-design open-source Voice AI at https://snips.ai (and we have cloud-matching performances: https://medium.com/snips-ai/snips-brings-cloud-level-spoken-... ) Disclaimer: I'm a co-founder We believe that people want more natural interaction and AI at home, but that it should never be at the cost of their privacy. You never know what a company, o…

Completely OT, but is the woman supposed to look that goofy/deformed?

https://imgur.com/a/DFgvNMt

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