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Tell HN: Otter.ai bot recording meetings without consent

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Re: Tell HN: Otter.ai bot recording meetings without consent

#61

Post by noasaservice »

bogwog wrote: post #12
that_guy_iain wrote: post #2

> I am not much of a privacy person but I feel completely abused in this situation. I have opened a support ticket with screenshots but there is no response, and according to Twitter they are essentially not reviewing tickets from free users at the moment. Important thing here is, you're not a customer. > Are there other, more privacy oriented transcription services anyone can recommend? Probably not, since this is p…

> Important thing here is, you're not a customer. That’s not the important thing at all. The important thing is the Otter.ai is violating the privacy of its users, potentially even breaking laws in some jurisdictions. If anything, it raises some more red flags that they’re ignoring consent for free users, since that could be interpreted as an attempt to monetize them by collecting data (again, without consent) If you…

Yeah, gotta "love" the 'we can break the law cause you didn't pay' HN philosophy.

I would derive great enjoyment of them in court in a 2 party state telling a judge "well since they weren't really a customer....."

Re: Tell HN: Otter.ai bot recording meetings without consent

#62

Post by resoluteteeth »

croes wrote: post #33
bombcar wrote: post #23

The big names provide recording and transcription now - Zoom has it, Teams has it (Teams apparently does it realtime and live and it's not bad, great for the deaf!). I suppose those are part of paid plans, and they trigger the "your shit is being recorded, dude." warnings.

Don't the need the permission of all participants to transcribe?

I think as long as you notify people and give them the opportunity to disconnect that's generally considered consent, as with 800 numbers where they tell you calls are recorded for quality assurance or whatever.

Re: Tell HN: Otter.ai bot recording meetings without consent

#63

Post by kordlessagain »

arikr wrote: post #16
xyos wrote: post #15

I just deleted my account because of that, also they share conversations with everyone in the meeting by DEFAULT, it wasn't nice receiving a message from a co-worker telling me that he received an email with the transcription it generated.

Wtf, that's terrible UX.

That's not what the UI says, or does. I signed up and actually looked, before posting.

Re: Tell HN: Otter.ai bot recording meetings without consent

#64

Post by resoluteteeth »

Bakary wrote: post #44

Is there such a thing as a simple audio transcribing system that can turn a recording into a text file? I have this problem where I sometimes forget a sentence someone JUST told me. And often my notes aren't sufficient compared to a verbatim recording because I'm liable to forget important contextual info very rapidly. But dealing with raw audio files is a PITA.

The VOSK library is good for transcription but there seems like a lack of good simple command line frontends for offline transcription of audio files.

mp4grep works and I've been using it but it has some unnecessary features if this is all you want to do (it's mainly designed to cache the transcriptions and let you search them rather than just write them to a text file) and hopefully someone will make a simpler command line transcription tool.

Re: Tell HN: Otter.ai bot recording meetings without consent

#66

Post by jwandborg »

klyrs wrote: post #28

Depending on where you live, that might violate wiretapping laws. Most of North America requires at least one party consent.

It could also not count as wiretapping, since it's about transcription, not about audio recordings.

If the transcription service's presence in the call isn't hidden from other participants, is it still wiretapping?

Re: Tell HN: Otter.ai bot recording meetings without consent

#67

Post by smachiz »

nvr219 wrote: post #41
croes wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't the need the permission of all participants to transcribe?

No you do not - at least not technically! I had to look into this at work. I looked at WebEx, Teams, and Zoom - all three let auto-transcribe just roll. I think on one of them it gives a quick popup saying it's transcribing but no consent required. Contrast with audio/video recording where Zoom lets you either consent or leave the meeting. I asked our legal counsel and they said it's kind of iffy whether live auto-tr…

In Teams at least, it's called transcription, but really it's captioning. It's not recorded unless you also turn on recording.

Re: Tell HN: Otter.ai bot recording meetings without consent

#68

Post by lathiat »

Bakary wrote: post #44

Is there such a thing as a simple audio transcribing system that can turn a recording into a text file? I have this problem where I sometimes forget a sentence someone JUST told me. And often my notes aren't sufficient compared to a verbatim recording because I'm liable to forget important contextual info very rapidly. But dealing with raw audio files is a PITA.

macOS added this to the OS

https://www.maketecheasier.com/enable-live-captions-ios-maco...

Google meet also has it built in on the client.

Edit: previously incorrectly linked to https://support.apple.com/en-au/guide/mac-help/mchlc1cb8d54/...

Re: Tell HN: Otter.ai bot recording meetings without consent

#69

Post by AJRF »

xyos wrote: post #15

I just deleted my account because of that, also they share conversations with everyone in the meeting by DEFAULT, it wasn't nice receiving a message from a co-worker telling me that he received an email with the transcription it generated.

Also deleted account. If anyone from Otter.ai is here - don't do this, reverse this change, email anyone affected since the change and apologise and also, i'd advise you to lawyer up.

Re: Tell HN: Otter.ai bot recording meetings without consent

#70

Post by [deleted] »

formerly_proven wrote: post #42
puma_ambit wrote: post #39

I stopped using them when I saw they share with everyone by default. I wanted the notes only for myself so I could be more present in meetings but not at the expense of making everyone feel like they have to watch what they're saying because it's being transcribed.

That approach sounds like a potential problem for more-than-one party consent jurisdictions.

[deleted]
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