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Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

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Re: Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

#141

Post by zachm0 »

asfginino wrote: post #90
chaboud wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s easy enough to test, but I don’t really need to. Alexa Guard has had this functionality for a while, and I’d expect the folks here at HN to be able to infer a few things from the support link and basic reasoning. Support link https://support.ring.com/hc/en-us/articles/360028205592-Usin... So: 1) if an event is detected, you can listen to a 10 second clip or drop in (2-way call) to listen in or look. 2) Echo devi…

>Furthermore, Amazon hasn’t cracked the code on hyper-efficient GB into KB lossless compression only to squirrel it away only for use in voice assistants. They could do speech recognition on the device and then ship off the plain text. I don't think they do this, but it is most certainly within their technical ability. As a practical example, I have a copy of a 458,045 word audiobook on my computer and I just downloa…

Small knit pick, but speech to text isn’t lossless. How someone says the words has a lot of impact on the meaning of those words. It’s possible Amazon doesn’t care about that lost information but that is a completely different conversation.

Re: Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

#142

Post by Espressosaurus »

tjpnz wrote: post #79

I'm surprised that people are outraged by this. It's a given that you're losing some privacy by putting one of these devices in your home. Any argument otherwise assumes that the companies manufacturing these devices are trustworthy. Thankfully the solution to this problem is simple.

Most people don't look at it that way, or they don't see the harm in doing so because it's all theoretical.

Re: Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

#143

Post by TeMPOraL »

joshuamorton wrote: post #123
tunap wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your words are as spurious as Goog's. Where you state Still means, they STOPPED scanning emails for targeted ads, supposedly in 2017(Did they "pinky-swear"?). So, they always did before, as stated it in plain words in 1st 2 paragraphs of their previous EULAs. Now that they claim they don't "scan emails for ads", they don't state they no longer scan emails and it does not state what they do, currently, scan emails for…

Well of course Gmail scans your email. Spam filtering requires scanning, not to mention things like putting labels in the emails. Why do you think Google would sell pii? It doesn't make business sense. (I work on Gmail)

> Why do you think Google would sell pii? It doesn't make business sense.

In these discussions, "selling PII" is sometimes a short for "providing a service that allows targeting ads based on PII without actually releasing PII itself to the service users", which is only a little less bad.

Re: Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

#144

Post by silasdavis »

How long until insurers start coercing customers into installing intrusive smart home devices in order to get reasonable premiums? It might not happen tomorrow but if enough people are willing to opt into alarm surveillance you can see how they could lower the liability for insurers.

Re: Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

#145

Post by throwaway936482 »

function_seven wrote: post #116
throwaway936482 wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just like they would never scan the content of your emails and serve up targeted ads based on that... Oh, wait, they were doing that up until 2017...

And they were upfront with it. When GMail was released, they straight up told users that’s how they were paying for the enormous 1GB storage.

I'm not going to trust memory, mine, yours or anyone's on this and don't have time to traipse back in time to fully research it, but that is besides the point. The point is that Google have form for engaging in privacy violations that extend to the scanning of personal communications for advertising purposes without gaining informed consent (no I don't think click through t&C's that can be changed by Google on a whim count). Worrying that they might do similar with verbal communications for advertising or other purposes is a legitimate concern that shouldn't be dismissed.

Re: Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

#146

Post by function_seven »

decasteve wrote: post #137
function_seven wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And they were upfront with it. When GMail was released, they straight up told users that’s how they were paying for the enormous 1GB storage.

Are you sure? Where's the citation to back that up? What I remember are many products released around that time by Google, et al that were sold to us as: we're making gobs of money off of our core offering (e.g. search + little text-based ads), that we can afford to all this other stuff for the benefit of humanity. So much was sold as "making the world a better place". The other sales pitch we got amounted to, "don't…

I remembered the discussions surrounding it when it was first released. Here's one submission on Slashdot that discussed the email scanning: https://slashdot.org/story/04/04/25/1438250/googles-gmail-go...

Here's one comment on slashdot: [0].

I have to laugh at this one [1]. It almost seems reversed these days (not quite, but kinda)

I'll see if I can dig up any press releases or official Google communications about it, but with linkrot what it is, it may take a while. (EDIT: Here's Google's privacy policy when Gmail was released [2])

[0] https://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=105335&cid=8965115

[1] https://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=105335&cid=8965194

[2] https://web.archive.org/web/20040404134002/http://gmail.goog...

Re: Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

#147

Post by Ijumfs »

eloff wrote: post #104
choeger wrote: post #97

I might sound like a grumpy old granddad to some of you (and I am not even that old), but did you really think that a huge company would offer to put microphones into your living room for your advantage? They are going to benefit from this and you are going to pay for it. How? For instance with dynamic pricing. Your loved ones tell you how much they want that vacation on that Greek island? Good luck finding a cheap f…

Any of those things would be such massive trust violations that the fallout would almost certainly sink the product and badly tarnish the company. That's not saying a company wouldn't be stupid enough to try it, but it's very clearly a bad business decision - so logically they wouldn't do it.

They already did it. It's done. The only thing to do now is cover the Internet in shills saying it won't or can't happen, even though it did. GPT-3 is up to the task.

Re: Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

#148

Post by joshuamorton »

jhardy54 wrote: post #74
TallGuyShort wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This thread is like Chris Farley's lines from Billy Madison. "That Veronica Vaughn is one hot piece of ass. And I know from experience." "No you don't" "Well not me personally, but this guy I know. Him and her GOT IT ON." "No they didn't" "But you can imagine what it would be like if they did."

No it isn't. Google didn't originally scan emails. Then they did. Then they didn't. Countering "Google scanned emails" with "well the don't right now" is the only ridiculous behavior in this thread.

But they did[0] from the beginning. And then later they stopped. There was no start then stop. There was only a stop.

(I work on Gmail)

[0]: https://privacyrights.org/resources/privacy-and-civil-libert... (from 2004, the year Gmail launched)

Re: Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

#149

Post by asfginino »

zachm0 wrote: post #141
asfginino wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Furthermore, Amazon hasn’t cracked the code on hyper-efficient GB into KB lossless compression only to squirrel it away only for use in voice assistants. They could do speech recognition on the device and then ship off the plain text. I don't think they do this, but it is most certainly within their technical ability. As a practical example, I have a copy of a 458,045 word audiobook on my computer and I just downloa…

Small knit pick, but speech to text isn’t lossless. How someone says the words has a lot of impact on the meaning of those words. It’s possible Amazon doesn’t care about that lost information but that is a completely different conversation.

That's true. Speech to text also isn't entirely accurate, which loses some information.

Even when they actually do ship audio off the device for processing, I'd be surprised if it's done losslessly.

Re: Google speakers are listening to more than just voice commands

#150

Post by Ijumfs »

svnpenn wrote: post #139

What the hell is going on in the comments here? It's like half the comments are edgelords with some version of "i am shocked that an advertising company would do such a thing" Has HN just turned into Reddit? Do people really not care that people's privacy is being dumped down the toilet? Google is known for shit like this. They even scan your emails and alert you when bills are due. Shit like that is not ok . Don't f…

Obviously Google runs extensive damage control on the Internet, and Dang is powerless to stop it.
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