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Yet that's basically what Amazon is doing to millions of us with her assistant Alexa in Echo speakers equipped with a microphone. And this is not the only case: polluting our homes is the next frontier of Silicon Valley.
Many owners of smart speakers do not realize this, but Amazon keeps a copy of all Alexa records after hearing its name. Apple's Siri and, until recently, Google's wizard, also retain by default records to help train their artificial intelligences.
So come with me in an unfortunate walk in the memory. I've been listening to my Alexa archives for four years and I've found thousands of fragments of my life: spaghetti-timer requests, jokes and random snippets of "Downton Abbey". There have even been sensitive conversations that have somehow triggered the recording of Alexa's message, including my family discussing drugs and a friend negotiating a case.
You can listen to your own Alexa archive here. Let me know what you discovered.
As far as we're concerned about spy apps on our computers and phones, our homes are the place where rubber really hits the road for privacy. It's easy to rationalize problems by thinking that a single speaker or smart device would know too much to be of importance. But in the increasingly connected home, there is a shameless data build-up, and there are few regulations, watchdogs, or common sense practices to control it.
Let's not repeat Facebook's mistakes in our smart homes. All personal data collected can and will be used against us. An obvious place to start: Alexa, stop recording.
"Eavesdropping" is a sensitive word for Amazon, who fought the confusion of consumers to know when, how and even who listens to us when we use an Alexa device. But a big part of this problem is of its own making.
Alexa keeps track of what he hears whenever an Echo speaker is activated. It is supposed to record only with a "wake up word" – "Alexa!" – but whoever owns any of these devices knows that it becomes naughty. I've counted dozens of times when mine has saved without a legitimate prompt. (Amazon claims to have improved the accuracy of "Alexa" by 50% over the past year.)
What can you do to prevent Alexa from recording? Amazon's answer comes straight from Facebook's game book: "Customers Have Control", it is said, but the product design clearly does not meet our needs. You can manually delete previous records if you know exactly where to look and if you remember to go back. You can not really stop Amazon from making these recordings, other than cutting the Echo's mic (offsetting its main purpose) or unplugging the damn thing.
The founder and CEO of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, owns the Washington Post, but I review all technologies with the same critical eye.
Amazon says that it keeps our records to improve the products, not to sell them. (This is also a Facebook line.) But whenever personal data is kept, they are in danger. Do you remember the family that sent Alexa accidentally to a random contact with the recording of a conversation? We have also seen judges issue warrants for Alexa.
Alexa's voice archives recently made headlines when Bloomberg discovered that Amazon employees were listening to recordings to train its artificial intelligence. Amazon acknowledged that some of these employees also had access to the location information of the devices that made the recordings.
Saving our voices is not just an Amazon phenomenon. Apple, which is much more privacy conscious in other aspects of the smart home, also keeps copies of conversations with Siri. According to Apple, voice data is given a "random identifier and is not linked to people" – but how can recording of your voice be anonymous? I do not understand why Apple does not give us the opportunity to say not to store our recordings.
The unexpected leader on this issue is Google. He was also recording all the conversations with his assistant, but last year he quietly changed his default settings to not record what he hears after the prompt "Hey, Google". But if you are one of the people who have previously configured Wizard, you will probably have to readjust your settings (check this box) to "pause" the recordings.
I'm not the only one to think that saving records is too close to the bug. Last week, the California State Assembly's Privacy Committee introduced an anti-eavesdropping bill that would require smart speaker manufacturers to obtain customer consent before storing. records. The Senate of Illinois has recently passed a bill on the same subject. In addition, the requirement to be able to register someone in private is enshrined in the legislation of many states.
"They give us false choices, we can have these devices and enjoy their features and how they improve our lives without compromising our privacy," said MP Jordan Cunningham, R, the godfather Bill. "Welcome to the era of watch capitalism."
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Inspired by what I found in my Alexa voice archive, I asked myself: What other activities of my smart home are recorded by tech companies?
I found enough personal data to make even the East German secret police blush.
When I get up for a midnight snack, Google knows it. My Nest Thermostat, manufactured by Google, reports in 15-minute increments to the data from its servers all the information about the climate of my house, but also about the displacement of someone (determined by a presence sensor used to trigger the heat). You can delete your account but, if it does not, Nest will save it indefinitely.
Then there are lights that can indicate what time you go to sleep and almost everything else. My lights connected to Philips Hue follow whenever they are turned on and on – data that the company keeps permanently if you log in to its cloud service (required to make them work with Alexa or Assistant).
Each type of appliance is becoming a data collection device. My Chamberlain MyQ garage opener allows the company to keep – again, indefinitely – a record of each time my door opens or closes. My Sonos speakers, by default, track which albums, which playlists or stations I have listened to, and when I press the play button, pauses, pauses, or increases the volume. At least they only keep my story for six months.
And now, the craziest part: after questioning these companies about data practices, I mostly learned to share what's happening at home with Amazon. Our data represent the price of entry for devices wishing to integrate with Alexa. Amazon does not just listen – it tracks everything that's happening at home.
Amazon acknowledges that it collects data on third-party devices even if you do not use Alexa to exploit them. Alexa needs to know the "status" of your devices "to enable a smart home smart experience". But keeping track of this data is more useful to them than us. (A feature called "intuitions" lets you know when a connected device is not in its usual state, such as a door that is not locked when sleeping, but I never have it found useful.) You can tell Amazon to delete everything learned about your home, but you can not examine it or stop Amazon from continuing to collect it.
The Google Assistant also collects data on the status of connected devices. But the company said it does not store the history of these devices, even if nothing seems to stop it.
Apple does the most admirable job of operating household devices by collecting as little data as possible. Its HomeKit software does not provide Apple with information about what's happening in your smart home. Instead, compatible devices communicate directly, via encryption, with your iPhone, where the data is located.
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Why do technology companies want to keep information from home? Sometimes they just do it because there is nothing to stop them – and they hope it could be useful in the future.
Ask companies why, and the answer usually involves AI.
"All saved data is used to enhance Siri," Apple said.
"Alexa is getting smarter, which is possible only by getting it to audio recording to better understand the requests, provide more accurate answers and personalize the experience." customer, "said Beatrice Geoffrin, director of privacy Alexa, in a statement. The recordings also help Alexa learn different accents and understand questions about recurring events such as the Olympics, she said.
Noah Goodman, a professor of computer science and psychology at Stanford University, told me that the AI needed data to become smarter.
"Technically, what they say is not unreasonable," he said. Current natural language processing systems need to re-execute their algorithms on old data to learn. Without easy access to data, their progress may slow down unless computer scientists make their systems more efficient.
But then he takes off his scientist's hat. "As a human being, I agree with you. I do not have one of those speakers at home," said Goodman.
We want to benefit from an AI able to set a timer or save energy when we do not need lighting. But that does not mean that we are opening our doors to technology companies as a lucrative source of data to train their algorithms, exploit our lives and perhaps lose in the next big hole. These data should belong to us.
What we miss is a way to understand the transformation that data and AI bring to us.
Think about "Downton Abbey": At that time, wealthy families could have human helpers who used their intelligence to observe and learn their habits and make their lives easier. Breakfast was always served exactly at the specified time. But the residents knew how to pay attention to what they let the staff see and hear.
Fast forward to today. We have not yet understood that we are filling our homes with digital assistants even more daring. Goodman said, "We do not think about Alexa or Nest, but we should do it."
This article was written by Geoffrey A. Fowler, Washington Post reporter.
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