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Alexa Is in Millions of Households—and Amazon Is Losing Billions (www.wsj.com)

submitted 3 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 28 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I can see why people are quick to think this but I don't see any compelling evidence this is the case, and as others have pointed out it would be impractical for them to do so.

More likely they use it for consumer lock-in and to collect data through its api endpoints. Collecting media activity and smart home device information is valuable enough on its own, before even approaching the value of collecting recorded audio.

They can already intuit consumer habits/word of mouth exposure from other associated data with your online activity. After locking down all my other privacy, the ads I get are far less relevant to me, even though I have a number of smart listening devices in my home

[–] [email protected] 18 points 3 months ago (1 children)

There's also the matter of there being literally hundreds of security and privacy researchers who would love nothing more than to catch Amazon doing this, and no one has in any major way.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 3 months ago (1 children)

It's always listening. They don't debate that.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Sure, no one is saying that. The point is that it doesn't send anything other than the stuff after the keywords back to company servers.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Or what it thinks is a keyword. Correct.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Well, obviously it operates on what it believes is a keyword. It does not have magically divine insight. Are you trying to imply they make them overly sensitive? I don't see the problem. Imagine the opposite. If they responded to less things they thought were keywords people would just think they're broken.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Just wanted to highlight they miss trigger.