Amazon just rolled out Alexa Guard, a new feature that lets your Echo monitor all the sounds in your house while you are away. If it hears a smoke alarm, carbon monoxide alarm, or glass breaking, it will send you a smart alert, playing the sound on your phone.
On one hand, this is a clever idea and requires no extra purchase on your end. Just tell Alexa you are leaving the house and Alexa will vigilantly listen as instructed. This is great for Amazon, as I’m sure it’ll help them sell more Echo devices.
On the other hand, I’m not sure how I would feel about knowing that Alexa was always listening and, if the moment was right, always ready to record a sound for posterity, especially if you came home and forgot to turn Alexa Guard off.
This just strikes me as anti-privacy.
On the other, other hand, I can’t help but think this is a feature Apple could easily implement, if they so chose. Would I feel any different with Apple eavesdropping, vs Amazon? I’m not sure.
Honestly, as much as I hate Amazon, Facebook, and Google, et al, tracking my every move, I really don’t mind it if Apple does. I definitely have a double standard, and it’s because I think Apple actually does have my best interests in mind.
They don’t. None of these companies have your interests in mind if they don’t align with their own. People really need to stop projecting their affection for products onto the companies and assume they’re reciprocated.
Also, how is this different than what is in a home security system like SimpliSafe. That said, it would be nice if it did something like announce that it is listening every hour (or user set timeframe). If it spooks a thief, all the better.
I unplug my SimpliSafe cameras from power when I get home. It would sort of defeat the purpose of Alexa to do the same.
I don’t really see how an OPT IN service is really a privacy travesty. I don’t like services with privacy implications that are OPT OUT or worse, can’t be disabled, but for those who like it, and go out of their way to turn it on… great!
It’s not that Apple has our interest at heart for altruistic reasons, it’s that their interests don’t lie in collecting and reselling my data but on selling me Apple products. I trust Apple at this point because the others all DO have a vested interest in monetizing my data, especially Facebook and Google. Apple… doesn’t. In fact, discovering that Apple was egregiously violating my privacy would directly harm their ability to sell me products which hurts them. Hence the incentive.
Finally, Apple’s architected a lot of things with an eye to data privacy when it would serve their interest to not do that. Look at all of the things that Google can do because they know a lot of things about you. Apple avoids that, even compromising their ability to compete to some degree, because they believe there are those of us out there who would prefer not to give up that much privacy for the service. And for me, they’re right.
It will be interesting to see is how Amazon monetizes this feature. Just as they used user photos to train their facial recognition system, I imagine they will use data from Guard to train audio recognition systems for law enforcement and military applications. A well-trained AI hooked into a citywide gunshot listening system would be able to identify a lot more than gunshots.
holy wow. there are just so, so many things wrong with this. it’s stunning, how easily we just shrug our shoulders and give up our privacy for a false sense of security. a tech writer should know better than to fall for this.
yes but because Apple’s business model is selling a product to me, and not selling me as the product to advertises, their interests are aligned with my own. Thus, the trust.
But you can turn Alexa Guard off as well.
no.
I mind. They are as multi-national corporation whose goal is to control your wallet.
This is the best comment I have ever read on this forum.
There is nothing interesting about how they will monetize this. This is another data point for them. The individual scenario doesn’t matter