How often do you use a smart speaker, like an Amazon Alexa? New research shows that smart devices like these could be collecting data on us at all times.
Geoffrey Fowler, a tech reporter for the Washington Post, found this out the hard way, and detailed his findings in an article called "Tour Amazon's dream home, where every appliance is also a spy."
The Amazon Echo -- which he said is the best selling speaker in history -- and others like it are always on.
"The microphone is always there, unless you reach over, hit that, you know, that mute button, which nobody does, because then it's pointless," he said. "What you'll discover is that by default, Amazon is keeping recordings of all the times that microphone kicks on."
He said the speaker kicks on not only when it hears its name, but also when it thinks it hears its name -- and it's wrong a lot.
Fowler went through the history of his own Echo speaker, looking through what he said was a "creepy" Amazon website to download the speaker's records.
"I found dozens and dozens and dozens of times when it made all these these kind of creepy recordings, what was going on in my house, you know, people talking about medical stuff, people talking about business deals," he said. "It really went off when I watch Downton Abbey a lot for some reason."
It goes further than that, though, he explained. Smart speakers are "hubs for all the other connected devices in your house," he explained. That means they're in touch with things like Ring doorbells, smart light switches and bulbs, and more.
"I went into Amazon as well, and I tried to download all the stuff that I knew about my house. And it had 600,000 data points about my house," he said.
That means that every time his lights were turned on or off with his smart light switches, every time someone walked in front of his doorbell, everytime the thermostat went on or off, and every time someone was at home, data points were being collected.
"Amazon could collect data about you when you talk, sleep, walk by one of their devices, show your face, cough, snore, come home, leave home, turn on the lights, turn up the heat, play music, watch TV, join a Wi-Fi network, wash your hands, even cook popcorn, receive a package, drive places. I mean, I could keep going on and on and on."
Fowler said he imagines Amazon is doing it for their own benefit, and knowing data about its consumers is good for them. By knowing our families, routines, bodies, and more, it can learn more and more about us.
Hear more from Geoffrey Fowler on what this means and why it happens:
Read his original article.
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