Technology has been our gateway to advance lifestyle and comfortable life. But little do we know, our privacy is slowy being stolen by these big tech giants.
Like our trending story today involving a woman who unknowingly been recorded by these high tech gadgets without her consent.
Amazon has been a leading online market for almost everything you need, from cars, jewelry, household items, gadgets, and many more.
Alexa is a virtual assistant technology developed by Amazon, first used in the Amazon Echo smart speaker and the Echo Dot, Echo Studio, and Amazon Tap speakers.
A device where we can use to make our lives easier but if you aren’t aware of the capabilities of this device, you have to think twice.
Recently, a woman who goes by the username “my.data.not.yours” on TikTok, posts lots of videos on the topics of privacy, reviews privacy policies, and gives people tips on how to limit (or at least be aware of) their digital footprint.
She explained how your Alexa device has been sneaking up and recording everything.
She quotes, “I requested all the data Amazon has on me, and here’s what I found, So when I downloaded the ZIP file these are all the folders it came with.”
Watch it here: TikTok/My.Data.Not.Yours
“The very last thing that I didn’t know that they had — I could have assumed that they have but I don’t love that they have — is my location, and I am not totally comfortable with everything they have,” she added.
This might be surprising for you but previously, CNBC reported what Amazon’s Echo can do:
Echo save a copy of everything you ask Alexa. That means there’s a whole collection of voice recordings logged for every request or command you’ve given Amazon’s voice assistant.
Amazon says that Alexa only begins recording when it thinks you’ve said the wake word (the default is “Alexa”), so it’s not listening all the time. But it sometimes uses a small sample of voice recordings to train the voice assistant to work better, which means in rare cases that humans might review those recordings to understand if Alexa misinterpreted a request.
If you use Amazon Alexa a lot, it’s worth knowing how to stop it from saving those recordings or using them for training.
Well, that makes sense but this woman on TikTok is just a friendly reminder for every user out there.
Amazon Spokesperson have also acknowledged this via statement told to New York Post:
“We give customers transparency and control over their Alexa experience,” the spokesperson said. “Customers can easily review and delete their voice recordings, or choose not to have them saved at all, at any time.
“Customers can import their mobile phone contacts to the Alexa app so they can use features like hands-free calling and messaging; this optional feature, which customers need to set up, can be disabled at any time.
“Finally, you can grant permissions for the Alexa app to use certain data, such as your mobile device’s geolocation, to provide relevant results (e.g., weather, traffic, restaurant recommendations), and you can manage these permissions in the app.”
Sources: The Western Journal, CNBC, New York Post
