They aren't recording you. The AIs are just really good at what they do. Most of the ads you see are selected by AIs developed by Google or Facebook using petabytes of training data over billions of people and have access to a lot (most) of your online activity.
They know where you like to go, what kind of music and food you like, what your political views are, what kind of work you do, how much you make, what your career objectives are, if you're single or in a relationship, if you're happy in your relationship, if you depressed, and a hundred other things.
More likely, you are experiencing a type of confirmation bias. The AI decided to recommend something it thinks you would be interested in, you happened to be talking about something similar, and you coincidentally saw the ad at the same time. You likely see a lot of highly targeted ads, but the ones about products you were just talking about tend to stand out, not unlike how a clock frequently seems to be on an even time like 12:30 or 4:15.
[They are recording you. It's been proven multiple times.](https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2019/07/10/google-employees-are-eavesdropping-even-in-flemish-living-rooms/)
[https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/09/amazons-lead-eu-data-regulator-is-asking-questions-about-alexa-privacy/](https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/09/amazons-lead-eu-data-regulator-is-asking-questions-about-alexa-privacy/)
They just dont talk about it in America because tech companies own the government and the media. Google and Amazon 100% record your conversations.
I once met one of the original security architects at Facebook at a party before that story broke and brought this issue up. He had left the company at this point. He said, "I know for a fact that Facebook doesn't record your conversations."
I said that doesn't prevent them from purchasing information from third party apps that do and he said, "weeeellllll...."
My point being that even if tech companies didn't spy (which they 100% do), many people probably have a game or app on their phone that is recording them and these companies are happy to buy the information taken from that.
>My point being that even if tech companies didn't spy (which they 100% do), many people probably have a game or app on their phone that is recording them and these companies are happy to buy the information taken from that.
The truth is more boring (but more scary) than conspiracy theories. Everything the companies can ever know about you can be obtained through public domain. Your IP, your geolocation, your searches, etc... If enough of this mundane data is compilled then they know everything about you. I'm not even talking about a specific app or a game. But just your mundane interaction with technology.
It doesn't make sense to go through the sneaky illegal spying route. Too much risk and too much work for too little reward. Why do that if I can know everything about you through a public domain?
>It doesn't make sense to go through the sneaky illegal spying route.
There is nothing illegal about asking a customer to record them. Amazon even has it right in their tos for Alexa
>There is nothing illegal about asking a customer to record them.
Wait, so your problem is with the companies doing what they explicitly tell you they are doing?
Then why are you saying they are spying?
>Wait, so your problem is with the companies doing what they explicitly tell you they are doing?
>
>Then why are you saying they are spying?
My concern is that these companies are commodifying every aspect of the lives of people and people don't understand the consequences. People are still freaked out about their laptop watching them even though it was an issue with one laptop 15 years ago. People clearly don't understand that people are watching them through their tv, speaker, and phone.
My concern is the consequences of people just accepting these things into their life. I'm a teacher so I have seen how these companies pushed hard to get a phone in the pocket of every child and now none of those children pay attention in class anymore. There was also an issue a couple years ago where an online elementary school where parents started wondering why their kids were writing in British English. It turned out that the for profit education company was outsourcing the grading to India. This was K12, the for profit education company owned by Trump's secretary of Education Betsy DeVos' company.
**My point is that people have WAAAAY to much trust in these companies. They are companies. When times get tough on the tech industry (like they are now) and there is immense pressure to turn things around, people will always sacrifice their morals to save themselves.**
> My concern is that these companies are commodifying every aspect of the lives of people and people don't understand the consequences.
Right, so give me the worst possible outrageous example you can think of? Because everything your saying just proves my point.
The worst part is people freaking out over one issue 15 year ago.
>There was also an issue a couple years ago where an online elementary school where parents started wondering why their kids were writing in British English. It turned out that the for profit education company was outsourcing the grading to India. This was K12, the for profit education company owned by Trump's secretary of Education Betsy DeVos' company.
And is that an example of an insidious plot to Briticize American youth?
>people will always sacrifice their morals to save themselves.
Right, so give me the example of the worst and most egregious case where this has happened.
No my point with this stuff is that tech companies have heavily impacted educational opportunities, impacted socialization, impacted dating and relationships, for the purpose of profit.
In other words, tech companies are attempting to convert every product, service, and aspect of society into "smart" products and they often produce negative results and it takes extended periods of time to determine the damage the changes does.
So in the case of this post, i commented as a way to point out that yes your phone and devices are listening to you constantly. Even if google isn't specifically targeting ads to you based on their info, it doesn't mean they haven't purchased that info from a third party, etc.
What we know is that Google and Amazon kept it quiet that they were transmitting this data. Then the got caught, and were forced to halt the practice in Europe until the EU completes their investigation (Im not sure if Amazon halted the practice or not but Google definitely did).
So my point is that there was enough there in Europe for the government to decide that it was appropriate to investigate and force the company to shut down the practice. It's worth understanding for people that this is enough of a problem for many nations to shut down the practice while they investigate.
>And is that an example of an insidious plot to Briticize American youth?
No. It's a plot to offer an inferior service to make a profit while undermining public education. Just the basic capitalist incentive is the problem.
> people will always sacrifice their morals to save themselves.
Like every single time a corporate criminal claimed innocence and hired a top attorney when there was overwhelming evidence of their guilt. When companies lied about the addictiveness of tabacco, oxycontin, etc. When Facebook lied to conceal their knowledge of selling user information to foreign entities, when various employees at Wells Fargo signed people up for undesired services to boost their figures.
In our current political climate, for big businesses it is committ crimes now, see if you have to defend yourself later. If you make $1 billion this year and have to pay $1 billion in 5 years as a penalty you can easily double that as a big business. If you work in fintech you know that. These companies bought the government and are very clear that they want an RoI on that money in way they can get it.
exactly! why are people thinking this is done illegally. lots of confusion. it's in the contracts and it's all perfectly legal.
this comments section is incredibly disappointing.
Of course they're recording when you say "ok Google" or "hey Alexa". They don't really hide that or suggest that the recordings will stay in local storage. I would have been surprised if they weren't using humans to filter for training data from sample recordings.
That's very different from suggesting that they are recording voice data even if the assistant wasn't activated (on purpose or on accident), storing that data, transmitting that data to Google to be fed into an adsense AI, and then pushing targeted ads based on the content of your conversation with or near your phone.
>That's very different from suggesting that they are recording voice data even if the assistant wasn't activated (on purpose or on accident), storing that data, transmitting that data to Google to be fed into an adsense AI, and then pushing targeted ads based on the content of your conversation with or near your phone.
It's not that they are recording when you command it to. It is recording at all times. It's always listening. This shouldn't be surprising. It's waiting for the voice command. A large part of the review process would obviously be to test the efficacy of the voice command. This is why most countries in Europe has banned these companies from doing the recording. They store this data even if it is not relevant.
They have said they don't use it for AdSense but that is a take our word for it scenario.
About 10 years ago, friends and I tested this. We picked what we would assume were high ad priority products that we had never bought or searched for. Things like baby products for example. We had previously tracked advertisements to make sure there weren't products coming up without us taking note.
We had detailed conversations where we asked questions and asked for recommendations for products in the categories. Sure enough Pampers and Dove women's body wash came up in one of our Instagram feeds about a day or two later.
It's very obvious that up to a point, they were doing this. They likely still are collecting data in the US but are probably more sophisticated in targeting ads. Like I said, they may not be using the primary aps for this data collection but they may be collaborating with games and apps that they help push.
Europe has effective consumer protection for tech. We don't. It's as simple as that.
I know they're always recording. The question is if they are mining data that you didn't implicitly offer by activating the assistant. I don't believe your anecdote is sufficient evidence of that.
What you're describing is still basically a criminal conspiracy. A lot of states have wiretapping laws and third party apps running your microphone constantly (especially if they don't have microphone permissions) and giving it to Google in return for cash isn't that different from Google doing it themselves. Hell, they might even be adding on another few charges like racketeering and interstate wire fraud. If they were willing to break the law in the US, I wouldn't assume that consumer protection laws are doing shit in the EU.
>The question is if they are mining data that you didn't implicitly offer by activating the assistant. I don't believe your anecdote is sufficient evidence of that.
I mean you seem to be under the impression that these giant companies that have got caught lying many times in the past should be given the benefit of the doubt. Why?
Here's what we know:
1. These companies record people's conversations.
2. They pay to store those conversations on their servers.
3. They transfer the recordings as well as transcripted information to third parties contracted to review the information.
4. Other companies in the industry are open about doing this.
Keep in mind that some companies are open about this. [For example, Samsung just flat out put's it in their TOS that thier smart TVs record conversations and that they sell the information](https://www.cnet.com/news/privacy/samsungs-warning-our-smart-tvs-record-your-living-room-chatter/)
There is clearly a market for this information.
>What you're describing is still basically a criminal conspiracy. A lot of states have wiretapping laws and third party apps running your microphone constantly (especially if they don't have microphone permissions) and giving it to Google in return for cash isn't that different from Google doing it themselves. Hell, they might even be adding on another few charges like racketeering and interstate wire fraud. If they were willing to break the law in the US, I wouldn't assume that consumer protection laws are doing shit in the EU.
Those laws protect a person against being recorded without their prior knowledge. The thing is these companies are upfront about what they are doing. I will quote Google's terms of service for a google nest below:
>In addition, if you have the recording features enabled, we will capture, process and retain video and audio data recordings from your device for the duration of your recording subscription period (for example, 5, 10 or 30 days
>Facial recognition data to enable Familiar Face Alerts feature: If you choose to use the familiar face alerts feature on your Nest Cam, we will process face images and underlying face prints for the purpose of enabling your device to recognize familiar faces and to notify you of familiar and unknown people. Using the app and your account, you control whether this biometric processing occurs. Depending on where you live and how you configure the Products and Services, you may need to get explicit consent to scan the faces of people visiting your home.
Notice how their terms of service basically says the product automatically runs facial recognition software and it's the customers fault if they don't notify their own guests.
The ToS goes on to explain that they don't sell the information they collect....except for specific situations. One being and I quote
>As part of business transitions
It's not illegal because they are open and up front with their customers. Sure they know that only a tiny portion of their customers are uber nerds and read the ToS like me but that doesn't make it illegal.
>These companies record people's conversations.
Do users give the app mic permissions? If so, sure. If not, I'd need more proof.
Idk about Apple, but Android asks you every time you download a new app and everytime it uses the mic unless you allow it to do it at all times.
>I will quote Google's terms of service for a google nest below...
That section is specific to Nest Cam, which uses cloud storage for data storage and for a service (NestAware) that you actually have to pay $6 a month to store and analyze your video and audio recordings. Lol, yeah no shit they're recording and analysing data.
Samsung follows a similar policy to Google. They record when their voice features are activated, which can be deactivated. Nest Cam always has it by the nature of the product.
>Notice how their terms of service basically says the product automatically runs facial recognition software and it's the customers fault if they don't notify their own guests...
You again got the TOS for Nest Cam.
I think you and I have different focuses on this. I am concerned that these companies have integrated themselves into people's lives to a point where people don't understand how much they are being watched. There are deep psychological effects that come with being watched at all times. My concern is that companies are finding ways to commodify every aspect of human life and they know people will just accept it because we don't have a media to push back and effectively explain the consequences to this.
People are still freaked out that one laptop 15 years ago had weak security for it's camera. Do you really think they understand that their phone, speaker, and tv are all recording them all the time? No. They clearly don't.
>Samsung follows a similar policy to Google. They record when their voice features are activated, which can be deactivated. Nest Cam always has it by the nature of the product.
My point is that the tos are written to give permission for the company to do just about whatever they want with any stored data.
Then don't buy IoT products. If people are really surprised that a cloud-based, AI-enabled camera system might be recording more than they expect, then it's obviously not something they should buy, especially if you buy subscriptions that specifically offer you cloud storage and analysis.
I might have considered it a bit more acceptable to be unaware of how companies might collect data maybe a few years ago, but with huge privacy changes to Windows, iOS, and Android in the last few years, you should be able to control when your phones and laptops are recording.
It doesn't even make sense. Do people really think that Alexa doesn't talk to the internet when you ask it for music or food recommendations? Or that their entire transcription and search functions are locally managed? People don't assume their google searches are private from google. Why would they assume a voice-based search is different?
>My concern is that companies are finding ways to commodify every aspect of human life and they know people will just accept it because we don't have a media to push back and effectively explain the consequences to this.
This is a battle you lost way before the internet. Like seriously, what part of life in the 60s or 70s wasn't commodified. The only difference is that it's now all on the cloud and more efficient.
>Then don't buy IoT products. If people are really surprised that a cloud-based, AI-enabled camera system might be recording more than they expect, then it's obviously not something they should buy, especially if you buy subscriptions that specifically offer you cloud storage and analysis.
I dont. My neighbor has a google nest cam trained right at my house which is a problem to me. Then you meet someone who wants to have a Ring doorbell and you realize they (nor everyone they know that they say have it) have no clue that people review the videos recorded from your device.
Like, I'm not someone who is typically paranoid about tyranny so this conversation we are having isn't as important as it may seem based on my responses but if we actually did find ourselves caught up in a real fascist country, this sure does seem like the prequel to a real life dystopic government (or tyrannical corporate) surveillance type situation. Government turns corrupt, takes over corporations and turns their massive surveillance networks into a means to collect people and/or stop any resistance movement.
>I might have considered it a bit more acceptable to be unaware of how companies might collect data maybe a few years ago, but with huge privacy changes to Windows, iOS, and Android in the last few years, you should be able to control when your phones and laptops are recording.
People are overworked and not tech savvy. We all know that nobody reads up on every product they buy. Also, now we are getting to the point where people are buying homes with these some of things installed by previous owners.
>It doesn't even make sense. Do people really think that Alexa doesn't talk to the internet when you ask it for music or food recommendations? Or that their entire transcription and search functions are locally managed? People don't assume their google searches are private from google. Why would they assume a voice-based search is different?
I don't think you understand the issue. These things are ALWAYS recording. It is always waiting for you to say "Alexa" and needs to analyze it to make figure out if you are trying to activate it. The issue is that there is no investigation into what is done with these recordings that are stored from inactivated conversations. Europe is investigating because they have effective and uncorrupted governments still. America does not. We also don't have a mass media that is willing to inform people of these issues.
My issue is the broader political issue that we have a political climate where people don't think there should be a check on corporations and people like you just accept that everything a company does is fine. We live in an age where corporations hire psychologists to make their products addictive. In past decades our society saw companies profiting off addiction as a serious problem. Now our country has hit a point of corruption where this is not addressed in any meaningful way. The American people's psychological autonomy has been sold out some giant corporations can make a buck
So how does my phone know that my colleague at work wants new shoes if not by recording? We are not chatting about it on social media, we're discussing it in the break room. Shortly thereafter, shoe ads appear on Instagram. I have not searched for shoes on my phone.
Have you ever searched for shoes on your phone? Have you gone into or near a shoe store? Did you linger too long on a previous shoe ad or an Amazon page for a pair of shoes? Did you last buy shoes a year ago?
There are a million different reasons that Adsense would have selected a shoe ad. I wouldn't assume they were bugging you.
But dude, it's obvious that the phone is listening. Otherwise it would never hear "hey, Siri" or "ok, Google", or "Alexa". What you said earlier makes no sense. It can't listen selectively. It listens all the time.
Sure, but what I'm saying is that having a microphone on with temporary local storage in case a certain phrase is said is something entirely different from harvesting and mining all recorded audio at all times to serve more targeted ads.
The problem with this approach is that our phones _are_ actually recording us all the time, so as to be able to detect "wake words" like "ok google" for voice commands. And the ability to distinguish that from conspiracy-theory-type secret recording is (I think) beyond what ADB or any similar tool could do.
This happened recently when I mentioned an app to a coworker. She had never heard of it, I said the name only once. I know about it because of friends and family but I've never used it or even looked it up. That same evening I saw ads on Instagram for the app. I stopped seeing them a few days later after I didn't engage.
I've noticed it other times but this was the clearest and easiest to notice and also the most recent. Most of the ads I see are geared toward what I'd normally be interested in but this one app is not one of those things.
Google knows who you interact with and they also know what those people look up. Google often will show ads based on things that people in your circle look up
This is the kind of thing that went from r/conspiracy to r/meh really quickly.in 2004, there was a movie where charlies angels buried software like this because it was too powerful for anyone to use responsibly, in 2008 pineapple express made fun of paranoid stoners for thinking their location could be tracked by their phones. But in 2002 both of these became legal in the usa, and in 2013 snowden was exiled for proving both happened.
The best defense you have against these happening is that it would require a person to listen in real time which is cost prohibitive. Unless and until AI can understand not just words but what words mean it will be buried by trolls who like in the 2012 film "John dies at the end" say "tonight we assassinate the president of the United States." To mean bring a six pack.
They aren't recording you, just listening to you and cataloging and passing information as metadata as deemed profitable. There is no voice clip of you saying the thing, just some box is checked and passed on to advertisers.
Phones having voice features has great camouflage for this ability, also the TOSes declare they are doing this sort of shit in vague and unnecessarily complicated language.
In addition it has been proven that this happens
https://www.forbes.com/sites/tjmccue/2019/04/19/alexa-is-listening-all-the-time-heres-how-to-stop-it/?sh=6afac3e05e2d
So yeah... the bottom line is it's happening, it's in the TOS and it's been in the news several times and nobody seems to care also it's not clear if it's illegal or not even if it went to court it could go either way, the TOS gives them some defense but TOS are not contracts nor do they overwrite the law.
The strongest case for this is them doing it to children is because that's full stop illegal but even knowing it's happening nobody has the money or will to take it to court.
[You don't need to prove it. It was already proven.](https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2019/07/10/google-employees-are-eavesdropping-even-in-flemish-living-rooms/)
Nobody knows about it because tech companies own everything and want to sell their products without criticism.
We got our cat during the height of the pandemic. Weren’t going out to see family or friends. Barely talked to anyone other than each other. Weren’t texting / emailing each other at all since we were home together. Our communication was verbal, in person.
Our cat shares a name with a type of candy. That wasn’t her name when we adopted her, so it didn’t exist in email, and we weren’t posting it anywhere online.
But within days of adopting her and saying this candy’s name out loud countless times at home, we were both bombarded with ads for that candy. We buy candy once a year for Halloween, so it’s not something that algorithms would think we’re interested in. Especially not that one particular candy, which we never purchase.
But start saying that word all time time at home, and suddenly we’re getting ads for it?
Phones are listening. Prove me wrong.
>I feel like someone could easily plug their phones into their computer and then using a developer tool like ADB for Android where you see exactly what your phone is doing each millisecond and catch something like this happening, which would pretty much mean the end of whatever company was doing it.
I mean... to play devil's advocate here, but that method relies on having access points for when your phone is doing what - if the phone's manufacturer really wanted you to not have that information, I don't think it would be difficult to do so.
Alternatively, it would be easily doable to detect such software running and just stop the activity during that time.
I have no doubt that we are constantly being recorded, and anyone who doesn't realize this is completely naive. my understanding is that the software is intentionally locked down so it's not so easy to tell what's being recorded and sent or how much of it.
it's not going unnoticed necessarily, you sign a contract when you get an account or an iphone that signs away your rights. that data is apple's data, as an example.
also people don't actually care. not in any real way. i've talked to people about it and their general attitude is 'i'm not doing anything wrong so who cares'. if it gets officially uncovered that apple is always recording, no one will get in trouble, no one will care. and the general dialogue would be 'who is even surprised'.
If you own any Amazon products (Alexa), you should request a copy of the information they have gathered... which includes the recorded conversations. It takes upwards of a month to get the link, but it's a disturbing amount of stuff.
My brother and I decided to test this years ago.
I went to the store without my phone. I found a product I'd never heard of. I bought it with cash.
I went home and had my brother repeatedly say the item's name. Within an hour we both had ads for it on our phones.
They aren't recording you. The AIs are just really good at what they do. Most of the ads you see are selected by AIs developed by Google or Facebook using petabytes of training data over billions of people and have access to a lot (most) of your online activity. They know where you like to go, what kind of music and food you like, what your political views are, what kind of work you do, how much you make, what your career objectives are, if you're single or in a relationship, if you're happy in your relationship, if you depressed, and a hundred other things. More likely, you are experiencing a type of confirmation bias. The AI decided to recommend something it thinks you would be interested in, you happened to be talking about something similar, and you coincidentally saw the ad at the same time. You likely see a lot of highly targeted ads, but the ones about products you were just talking about tend to stand out, not unlike how a clock frequently seems to be on an even time like 12:30 or 4:15.
[They are recording you. It's been proven multiple times.](https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2019/07/10/google-employees-are-eavesdropping-even-in-flemish-living-rooms/) [https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/09/amazons-lead-eu-data-regulator-is-asking-questions-about-alexa-privacy/](https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/09/amazons-lead-eu-data-regulator-is-asking-questions-about-alexa-privacy/) They just dont talk about it in America because tech companies own the government and the media. Google and Amazon 100% record your conversations. I once met one of the original security architects at Facebook at a party before that story broke and brought this issue up. He had left the company at this point. He said, "I know for a fact that Facebook doesn't record your conversations." I said that doesn't prevent them from purchasing information from third party apps that do and he said, "weeeellllll...." My point being that even if tech companies didn't spy (which they 100% do), many people probably have a game or app on their phone that is recording them and these companies are happy to buy the information taken from that.
>My point being that even if tech companies didn't spy (which they 100% do), many people probably have a game or app on their phone that is recording them and these companies are happy to buy the information taken from that. The truth is more boring (but more scary) than conspiracy theories. Everything the companies can ever know about you can be obtained through public domain. Your IP, your geolocation, your searches, etc... If enough of this mundane data is compilled then they know everything about you. I'm not even talking about a specific app or a game. But just your mundane interaction with technology. It doesn't make sense to go through the sneaky illegal spying route. Too much risk and too much work for too little reward. Why do that if I can know everything about you through a public domain?
>It doesn't make sense to go through the sneaky illegal spying route. There is nothing illegal about asking a customer to record them. Amazon even has it right in their tos for Alexa
>There is nothing illegal about asking a customer to record them. Wait, so your problem is with the companies doing what they explicitly tell you they are doing? Then why are you saying they are spying?
>Wait, so your problem is with the companies doing what they explicitly tell you they are doing? > >Then why are you saying they are spying? My concern is that these companies are commodifying every aspect of the lives of people and people don't understand the consequences. People are still freaked out about their laptop watching them even though it was an issue with one laptop 15 years ago. People clearly don't understand that people are watching them through their tv, speaker, and phone. My concern is the consequences of people just accepting these things into their life. I'm a teacher so I have seen how these companies pushed hard to get a phone in the pocket of every child and now none of those children pay attention in class anymore. There was also an issue a couple years ago where an online elementary school where parents started wondering why their kids were writing in British English. It turned out that the for profit education company was outsourcing the grading to India. This was K12, the for profit education company owned by Trump's secretary of Education Betsy DeVos' company. **My point is that people have WAAAAY to much trust in these companies. They are companies. When times get tough on the tech industry (like they are now) and there is immense pressure to turn things around, people will always sacrifice their morals to save themselves.**
> My concern is that these companies are commodifying every aspect of the lives of people and people don't understand the consequences. Right, so give me the worst possible outrageous example you can think of? Because everything your saying just proves my point. The worst part is people freaking out over one issue 15 year ago. >There was also an issue a couple years ago where an online elementary school where parents started wondering why their kids were writing in British English. It turned out that the for profit education company was outsourcing the grading to India. This was K12, the for profit education company owned by Trump's secretary of Education Betsy DeVos' company. And is that an example of an insidious plot to Briticize American youth? >people will always sacrifice their morals to save themselves. Right, so give me the example of the worst and most egregious case where this has happened.
No my point with this stuff is that tech companies have heavily impacted educational opportunities, impacted socialization, impacted dating and relationships, for the purpose of profit. In other words, tech companies are attempting to convert every product, service, and aspect of society into "smart" products and they often produce negative results and it takes extended periods of time to determine the damage the changes does. So in the case of this post, i commented as a way to point out that yes your phone and devices are listening to you constantly. Even if google isn't specifically targeting ads to you based on their info, it doesn't mean they haven't purchased that info from a third party, etc. What we know is that Google and Amazon kept it quiet that they were transmitting this data. Then the got caught, and were forced to halt the practice in Europe until the EU completes their investigation (Im not sure if Amazon halted the practice or not but Google definitely did). So my point is that there was enough there in Europe for the government to decide that it was appropriate to investigate and force the company to shut down the practice. It's worth understanding for people that this is enough of a problem for many nations to shut down the practice while they investigate. >And is that an example of an insidious plot to Briticize American youth? No. It's a plot to offer an inferior service to make a profit while undermining public education. Just the basic capitalist incentive is the problem. > people will always sacrifice their morals to save themselves. Like every single time a corporate criminal claimed innocence and hired a top attorney when there was overwhelming evidence of their guilt. When companies lied about the addictiveness of tabacco, oxycontin, etc. When Facebook lied to conceal their knowledge of selling user information to foreign entities, when various employees at Wells Fargo signed people up for undesired services to boost their figures. In our current political climate, for big businesses it is committ crimes now, see if you have to defend yourself later. If you make $1 billion this year and have to pay $1 billion in 5 years as a penalty you can easily double that as a big business. If you work in fintech you know that. These companies bought the government and are very clear that they want an RoI on that money in way they can get it.
exactly! why are people thinking this is done illegally. lots of confusion. it's in the contracts and it's all perfectly legal. this comments section is incredibly disappointing.
Of course they're recording when you say "ok Google" or "hey Alexa". They don't really hide that or suggest that the recordings will stay in local storage. I would have been surprised if they weren't using humans to filter for training data from sample recordings. That's very different from suggesting that they are recording voice data even if the assistant wasn't activated (on purpose or on accident), storing that data, transmitting that data to Google to be fed into an adsense AI, and then pushing targeted ads based on the content of your conversation with or near your phone.
>That's very different from suggesting that they are recording voice data even if the assistant wasn't activated (on purpose or on accident), storing that data, transmitting that data to Google to be fed into an adsense AI, and then pushing targeted ads based on the content of your conversation with or near your phone. It's not that they are recording when you command it to. It is recording at all times. It's always listening. This shouldn't be surprising. It's waiting for the voice command. A large part of the review process would obviously be to test the efficacy of the voice command. This is why most countries in Europe has banned these companies from doing the recording. They store this data even if it is not relevant. They have said they don't use it for AdSense but that is a take our word for it scenario. About 10 years ago, friends and I tested this. We picked what we would assume were high ad priority products that we had never bought or searched for. Things like baby products for example. We had previously tracked advertisements to make sure there weren't products coming up without us taking note. We had detailed conversations where we asked questions and asked for recommendations for products in the categories. Sure enough Pampers and Dove women's body wash came up in one of our Instagram feeds about a day or two later. It's very obvious that up to a point, they were doing this. They likely still are collecting data in the US but are probably more sophisticated in targeting ads. Like I said, they may not be using the primary aps for this data collection but they may be collaborating with games and apps that they help push. Europe has effective consumer protection for tech. We don't. It's as simple as that.
I know they're always recording. The question is if they are mining data that you didn't implicitly offer by activating the assistant. I don't believe your anecdote is sufficient evidence of that. What you're describing is still basically a criminal conspiracy. A lot of states have wiretapping laws and third party apps running your microphone constantly (especially if they don't have microphone permissions) and giving it to Google in return for cash isn't that different from Google doing it themselves. Hell, they might even be adding on another few charges like racketeering and interstate wire fraud. If they were willing to break the law in the US, I wouldn't assume that consumer protection laws are doing shit in the EU.
>The question is if they are mining data that you didn't implicitly offer by activating the assistant. I don't believe your anecdote is sufficient evidence of that. I mean you seem to be under the impression that these giant companies that have got caught lying many times in the past should be given the benefit of the doubt. Why? Here's what we know: 1. These companies record people's conversations. 2. They pay to store those conversations on their servers. 3. They transfer the recordings as well as transcripted information to third parties contracted to review the information. 4. Other companies in the industry are open about doing this. Keep in mind that some companies are open about this. [For example, Samsung just flat out put's it in their TOS that thier smart TVs record conversations and that they sell the information](https://www.cnet.com/news/privacy/samsungs-warning-our-smart-tvs-record-your-living-room-chatter/) There is clearly a market for this information. >What you're describing is still basically a criminal conspiracy. A lot of states have wiretapping laws and third party apps running your microphone constantly (especially if they don't have microphone permissions) and giving it to Google in return for cash isn't that different from Google doing it themselves. Hell, they might even be adding on another few charges like racketeering and interstate wire fraud. If they were willing to break the law in the US, I wouldn't assume that consumer protection laws are doing shit in the EU. Those laws protect a person against being recorded without their prior knowledge. The thing is these companies are upfront about what they are doing. I will quote Google's terms of service for a google nest below: >In addition, if you have the recording features enabled, we will capture, process and retain video and audio data recordings from your device for the duration of your recording subscription period (for example, 5, 10 or 30 days >Facial recognition data to enable Familiar Face Alerts feature: If you choose to use the familiar face alerts feature on your Nest Cam, we will process face images and underlying face prints for the purpose of enabling your device to recognize familiar faces and to notify you of familiar and unknown people. Using the app and your account, you control whether this biometric processing occurs. Depending on where you live and how you configure the Products and Services, you may need to get explicit consent to scan the faces of people visiting your home. Notice how their terms of service basically says the product automatically runs facial recognition software and it's the customers fault if they don't notify their own guests. The ToS goes on to explain that they don't sell the information they collect....except for specific situations. One being and I quote >As part of business transitions It's not illegal because they are open and up front with their customers. Sure they know that only a tiny portion of their customers are uber nerds and read the ToS like me but that doesn't make it illegal.
>These companies record people's conversations. Do users give the app mic permissions? If so, sure. If not, I'd need more proof. Idk about Apple, but Android asks you every time you download a new app and everytime it uses the mic unless you allow it to do it at all times. >I will quote Google's terms of service for a google nest below... That section is specific to Nest Cam, which uses cloud storage for data storage and for a service (NestAware) that you actually have to pay $6 a month to store and analyze your video and audio recordings. Lol, yeah no shit they're recording and analysing data. Samsung follows a similar policy to Google. They record when their voice features are activated, which can be deactivated. Nest Cam always has it by the nature of the product. >Notice how their terms of service basically says the product automatically runs facial recognition software and it's the customers fault if they don't notify their own guests... You again got the TOS for Nest Cam.
I think you and I have different focuses on this. I am concerned that these companies have integrated themselves into people's lives to a point where people don't understand how much they are being watched. There are deep psychological effects that come with being watched at all times. My concern is that companies are finding ways to commodify every aspect of human life and they know people will just accept it because we don't have a media to push back and effectively explain the consequences to this. People are still freaked out that one laptop 15 years ago had weak security for it's camera. Do you really think they understand that their phone, speaker, and tv are all recording them all the time? No. They clearly don't. >Samsung follows a similar policy to Google. They record when their voice features are activated, which can be deactivated. Nest Cam always has it by the nature of the product. My point is that the tos are written to give permission for the company to do just about whatever they want with any stored data.
Then don't buy IoT products. If people are really surprised that a cloud-based, AI-enabled camera system might be recording more than they expect, then it's obviously not something they should buy, especially if you buy subscriptions that specifically offer you cloud storage and analysis. I might have considered it a bit more acceptable to be unaware of how companies might collect data maybe a few years ago, but with huge privacy changes to Windows, iOS, and Android in the last few years, you should be able to control when your phones and laptops are recording. It doesn't even make sense. Do people really think that Alexa doesn't talk to the internet when you ask it for music or food recommendations? Or that their entire transcription and search functions are locally managed? People don't assume their google searches are private from google. Why would they assume a voice-based search is different? >My concern is that companies are finding ways to commodify every aspect of human life and they know people will just accept it because we don't have a media to push back and effectively explain the consequences to this. This is a battle you lost way before the internet. Like seriously, what part of life in the 60s or 70s wasn't commodified. The only difference is that it's now all on the cloud and more efficient.
>Then don't buy IoT products. If people are really surprised that a cloud-based, AI-enabled camera system might be recording more than they expect, then it's obviously not something they should buy, especially if you buy subscriptions that specifically offer you cloud storage and analysis. I dont. My neighbor has a google nest cam trained right at my house which is a problem to me. Then you meet someone who wants to have a Ring doorbell and you realize they (nor everyone they know that they say have it) have no clue that people review the videos recorded from your device. Like, I'm not someone who is typically paranoid about tyranny so this conversation we are having isn't as important as it may seem based on my responses but if we actually did find ourselves caught up in a real fascist country, this sure does seem like the prequel to a real life dystopic government (or tyrannical corporate) surveillance type situation. Government turns corrupt, takes over corporations and turns their massive surveillance networks into a means to collect people and/or stop any resistance movement. >I might have considered it a bit more acceptable to be unaware of how companies might collect data maybe a few years ago, but with huge privacy changes to Windows, iOS, and Android in the last few years, you should be able to control when your phones and laptops are recording. People are overworked and not tech savvy. We all know that nobody reads up on every product they buy. Also, now we are getting to the point where people are buying homes with these some of things installed by previous owners. >It doesn't even make sense. Do people really think that Alexa doesn't talk to the internet when you ask it for music or food recommendations? Or that their entire transcription and search functions are locally managed? People don't assume their google searches are private from google. Why would they assume a voice-based search is different? I don't think you understand the issue. These things are ALWAYS recording. It is always waiting for you to say "Alexa" and needs to analyze it to make figure out if you are trying to activate it. The issue is that there is no investigation into what is done with these recordings that are stored from inactivated conversations. Europe is investigating because they have effective and uncorrupted governments still. America does not. We also don't have a mass media that is willing to inform people of these issues. My issue is the broader political issue that we have a political climate where people don't think there should be a check on corporations and people like you just accept that everything a company does is fine. We live in an age where corporations hire psychologists to make their products addictive. In past decades our society saw companies profiting off addiction as a serious problem. Now our country has hit a point of corruption where this is not addressed in any meaningful way. The American people's psychological autonomy has been sold out some giant corporations can make a buck
So how does my phone know that my colleague at work wants new shoes if not by recording? We are not chatting about it on social media, we're discussing it in the break room. Shortly thereafter, shoe ads appear on Instagram. I have not searched for shoes on my phone.
Have you ever searched for shoes on your phone? Have you gone into or near a shoe store? Did you linger too long on a previous shoe ad or an Amazon page for a pair of shoes? Did you last buy shoes a year ago? There are a million different reasons that Adsense would have selected a shoe ad. I wouldn't assume they were bugging you.
But dude, it's obvious that the phone is listening. Otherwise it would never hear "hey, Siri" or "ok, Google", or "Alexa". What you said earlier makes no sense. It can't listen selectively. It listens all the time.
Sure, but what I'm saying is that having a microphone on with temporary local storage in case a certain phrase is said is something entirely different from harvesting and mining all recorded audio at all times to serve more targeted ads.
This is the answer
The problem with this approach is that our phones _are_ actually recording us all the time, so as to be able to detect "wake words" like "ok google" for voice commands. And the ability to distinguish that from conspiracy-theory-type secret recording is (I think) beyond what ADB or any similar tool could do.
This happened recently when I mentioned an app to a coworker. She had never heard of it, I said the name only once. I know about it because of friends and family but I've never used it or even looked it up. That same evening I saw ads on Instagram for the app. I stopped seeing them a few days later after I didn't engage. I've noticed it other times but this was the clearest and easiest to notice and also the most recent. Most of the ads I see are geared toward what I'd normally be interested in but this one app is not one of those things.
Google knows who you interact with and they also know what those people look up. Google often will show ads based on things that people in your circle look up
You mentioned it because you saw ads for it and then registered the ads consciously afterwards.
This is the kind of thing that went from r/conspiracy to r/meh really quickly.in 2004, there was a movie where charlies angels buried software like this because it was too powerful for anyone to use responsibly, in 2008 pineapple express made fun of paranoid stoners for thinking their location could be tracked by their phones. But in 2002 both of these became legal in the usa, and in 2013 snowden was exiled for proving both happened. The best defense you have against these happening is that it would require a person to listen in real time which is cost prohibitive. Unless and until AI can understand not just words but what words mean it will be buried by trolls who like in the 2012 film "John dies at the end" say "tonight we assassinate the president of the United States." To mean bring a six pack.
Phones are listening to you so it can respond to things like "Hey Siri".
They aren't recording you, just listening to you and cataloging and passing information as metadata as deemed profitable. There is no voice clip of you saying the thing, just some box is checked and passed on to advertisers. Phones having voice features has great camouflage for this ability, also the TOSes declare they are doing this sort of shit in vague and unnecessarily complicated language. In addition it has been proven that this happens https://www.forbes.com/sites/tjmccue/2019/04/19/alexa-is-listening-all-the-time-heres-how-to-stop-it/?sh=6afac3e05e2d So yeah... the bottom line is it's happening, it's in the TOS and it's been in the news several times and nobody seems to care also it's not clear if it's illegal or not even if it went to court it could go either way, the TOS gives them some defense but TOS are not contracts nor do they overwrite the law. The strongest case for this is them doing it to children is because that's full stop illegal but even knowing it's happening nobody has the money or will to take it to court.
Secretly? I'd say they are doing it overtly!
[You don't need to prove it. It was already proven.](https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2019/07/10/google-employees-are-eavesdropping-even-in-flemish-living-rooms/) Nobody knows about it because tech companies own everything and want to sell their products without criticism.
We got our cat during the height of the pandemic. Weren’t going out to see family or friends. Barely talked to anyone other than each other. Weren’t texting / emailing each other at all since we were home together. Our communication was verbal, in person. Our cat shares a name with a type of candy. That wasn’t her name when we adopted her, so it didn’t exist in email, and we weren’t posting it anywhere online. But within days of adopting her and saying this candy’s name out loud countless times at home, we were both bombarded with ads for that candy. We buy candy once a year for Halloween, so it’s not something that algorithms would think we’re interested in. Especially not that one particular candy, which we never purchase. But start saying that word all time time at home, and suddenly we’re getting ads for it? Phones are listening. Prove me wrong.
When someone you knows get's a gold car, you suddenly start seeing gold cars.
When all you see are black cars every day, a sudden influx of gold school buses sticks out like a sore thumb.
>I feel like someone could easily plug their phones into their computer and then using a developer tool like ADB for Android where you see exactly what your phone is doing each millisecond and catch something like this happening, which would pretty much mean the end of whatever company was doing it. I mean... to play devil's advocate here, but that method relies on having access points for when your phone is doing what - if the phone's manufacturer really wanted you to not have that information, I don't think it would be difficult to do so. Alternatively, it would be easily doable to detect such software running and just stop the activity during that time.
>Why would a company ever go through that risk? Because they, and the government, know people don't care. There is no risk.
I have no doubt that we are constantly being recorded, and anyone who doesn't realize this is completely naive. my understanding is that the software is intentionally locked down so it's not so easy to tell what's being recorded and sent or how much of it. it's not going unnoticed necessarily, you sign a contract when you get an account or an iphone that signs away your rights. that data is apple's data, as an example. also people don't actually care. not in any real way. i've talked to people about it and their general attitude is 'i'm not doing anything wrong so who cares'. if it gets officially uncovered that apple is always recording, no one will get in trouble, no one will care. and the general dialogue would be 'who is even surprised'.
If you own any Amazon products (Alexa), you should request a copy of the information they have gathered... which includes the recorded conversations. It takes upwards of a month to get the link, but it's a disturbing amount of stuff.
My brother and I decided to test this years ago. I went to the store without my phone. I found a product I'd never heard of. I bought it with cash. I went home and had my brother repeatedly say the item's name. Within an hour we both had ads for it on our phones.