Amazon adds option allowing users to disable human reviews of their Alexa recordings

August 2nd

Amazon Echo device (Andres Urena/Pexels)

Amazon has annouced that it will allow users to opt-out of its manual review program that employs humans to listen to, transcribe, and annotate audio clips recorded by Alexa.

Amazon wrote the following to Bloomberg:

“We take customer privacy seriously and continuously review our practices and procedures,” the Amazon spokeswoman wrote in an email Friday. “We’ll also be updating information we provide to customers to make our practices more clear.”

Amazon Alexa

Alexa is embedded in more devices than any other AI assistant, from kitchen appliances to cars, security cameras and jewlery. She also plays multiple roles. At times a home automator, Alexa can also be a point-of-contact with police and an audio playmate for children. She may also soon speak with others on your behalf, according to announcements from Amazon's latest hardware event. Follow news on Alexa here. Read more →

Alexa pushes deeper into ambient computing with new wearables and a long-distance wireless network

September 26th

At its annual hardware event, Amazon announced an array of new devices, appliances, and features for its Alexa AI assistant.

Alexa adds support for Hindi, India's most widely used language

September 18th

The move follows Amazon's Hindi language site and apps launch last year.

The contractors listening to AI assistant audio

To answer the questions you ask Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant, tech companies have employed armies contractors to listen to recordings and take notes. Read more →

Facebook reinstates program to record audio on its Portal smart home devices

September 19th

Like Amazon, Google, Apple and Microsoft, the company is now under fire for manually listening to AI assistant-recorded audio.

Sections

Surveillance and Privacy

August 16th

AI-enabled technologies produce and rely on vast troves of personal data, most of which is unregulated and vulnerable to theft and misuse.

These technologies include:

Facial recognition: It helps users unlock their smartphones. It also helps police in China track criminal suspects and monitor members of the Uyghur ethnic minority.
Personalization: It helps consumers make necessary purchases and discover entertainment, but also encourages developers to collect personal data from increasingly far-flung sources.
Voice assistants: They help users answer questions, create calendar events, and set alarms. They also record audio accidentally, and until recently relied on human reviewers to listen to private audio to improve their responses.
Smart home products: Similar to voice assistants, these products allow users to remotely operate appliances, set temperatures and access security footage. They also collect a vast amount of private information about the home life of their users.

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