Amazon files a patent to register before saying "Alexa"



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Amazon wants to patent the system for its smart home devices by capturing and processing speech before the word standby.

Amazon

Amazon has filed a patent application for a method that allows Alexa to start recording before anyone uses the waking word.

The patent filing, first spotted by BuzzFeed News, would capture and process incoming audio, detect long pauses, and send the data to a remote server while Alexa waited for the wake-up message.

"When the system detects a wake-up word in a particular utterance, it determines the most recent utterance change location before the wake-up word and sends the audio from that location to the end of the alarm. # 39; statement of command to a server for further processing of speech ", explains in the patent filing.

Amazon has filed a patent application for the method that receives speech audio, buffers that data, determines whether the audio includes "a number of consecutive audio frames with a level of energy below a threshold" and decides via a tone and a speed if a new pronunciation has taken place.

The system then discovers and records "location" in the sentence where a new statement has occurred, detects the wakeup word in a second location of the speech and sends some of that audio data to be processed on a remote server, regardless of the "start". part of the audio data is speech in the first place. "

He then determines the end of the new pronunciation in a third location of the sentence; finishes sending audio data to the remote server; receives the control data from the remote server; and execute the control data.

The patent was filed in January 2019.

Amazon is facing criticisms about user data storageOn Thursday, an American senator asked his CEO, Jeff Bezos, to explain whether Amazon stored indefinitely the textual transcripts of voice recordings of people talking to Alexa on a smart device.

Senator Chris Coons, a Delaware Democrat and member of the Judiciary Committee, sent a letter to Bezos about the company's privacy and data security practices, claiming that Echo could put endanger the privacy of users.

Coons' letter follows a CNET report this month that Amazon keeps text records of what users are asking Alexa for.

The impossibility of deleting the textual transcription of audio recordings "makes the option of deleting the recording largely devoid of consequence," said the senator.

Once Alexa has heard her word, which could be "Echo", "Alexa" or "Computer," Echo starts listening and transcribing what she hears. Although Amazon allows you to erase these voice recordings, it keeps the data as a text file on its cloud servers.

Earlier this month, Amazon announced that it was deleting text files from Alexa's main system and was working to remove them from other areas of the system.

Amazon has sold more than 100 million Alexa devices, dominating the smart speaker market with a market share of about 70%. Next come Google Home, with 24% of the market, and Apple's HomePod, with 6%.


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