We’ve seen movies like Terminator and I, Robot, where advanced technology threatens the human race. And while that may seem a bit far off in the distance or even impossible to some, there is current technology that threatens your privacy. This is fact!
Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant are always listening
Let’s start with the obvious one. Voice assistants have to record your voice when you make commands, whether you want it to or not. Without the ability to listen, voice assistants like Alexa, Google Home, and Bixby loses their primary function, which is to carry out commands ordered by speech. You’ll be pleased to know that there are mute buttons and “wake commands,” such as “hey Google” or “Alexa.” While the speech outside of those commands are not sent over networks, it will still be recorded by your device. But remember that once those magic words are spoken, all following dialogue will be transmitted to databases.
Finders keepers
Everything you command and all the conversations you have with voice assistants are stored into the product’s company database. That’s right, Google, Samsung, Amazon, Microsoft, Apple are all holding onto your voices. Fortunately, you are free to delete these recordings, but it’s still a little creepy to think that someone is keeping your voice in a folder in the first place.
Tell me more about yourself
When you converse with voice assistants, it seems like a simple exchange. You give a command and the AI performs it. But there’s more to it than that. The AI is designed to learn and adapt based on your conversations with it. It ensures that procedures will be quicker and tasks will be performed faster with pre-recorded dialogue. This means that your preferences, frequent commands, and interests are being observed and studied by others behind the AI.
Where does it go?
All of the audio files get sent to large databases to be examined by people you’ve never met before. The brains behind the screens incorporate this data to upgrade their AI technology to improve accuracy, performance, and other important aspects of voice assistants. With all the help we’re providing, it’s almost a little unfair that we aren’t getting a cut of the profit!
(Un)wanted ads
When you’re sending information to some of the biggest brands in the world, you can be sure they’ll put it to good use. Remember those preferences, interests, and habits that you unknowingly transmit? Companies utilize this information to market products to you. You might be asking your voice assistant to play a lot of songs by a certain artist. The next time you go online, you might find snippets advertising albums and merchandise supporting that music artist. I lost count how many times I’ve seen an ad and thought, “hey, how’d you know?”
Vulnerability to internet thieves
The leaders in charge of voice assistant products are confident that the network through which audio data is transmitted is secure and safe. That’s great if we can trust word of mouth, but what if it isn’t? If we’re vulnerable to hackers and viruses, we could be leaking out lots of personal information. Phone numbers, schedules, employment information, and more are potentially at stake. It’s already a little unsettling to be providing these to companies, but to have them unknowingly stolen by complete strangers? That would be devastating.
Lose your voice
I mean this literally. When you give a command to a voice assistant, it automatically records. When it records, it automatically sends it to the product’s database. Once the recording is stored, the product’s company has rights to utilize that recording how they wish.
In short, when you orally command an AI, that dialogue is no longer yours.
Your word against yours
While imitation may be the best form of flattery, it can also be the most annoying. In the case that cyber thieves are able to hack the voice assistant, what’s stopping them from using your recorded speech for scams such as voice phishing and accessing accounts that require vocal recognition? If they’re tech-savvy enough to break into some of the biggest companies’ encrypted data, it should be no problem for them to reorganize dialogue and make you say what they want you to say.
More than words
Apart from your voice and conversations, the assistants collect a lot of data attached to your accounts. This includes information in your computer, TV, and even household appliances. The assistants need to be linked to those devices and the programs in those devices in order to control them, and that allows a lot of personal data to be collected from you.
Privacy risks in the future
We’re quite impressed with the abilities of voice assistants, but now that we know the sacrifice and risks in using these products, how much more do we want it to develop? Companies like Samsung and Google hope their products can eventually process commands outside of phones and homes. They visualize voice AIs carrying out complicated tasks such as driving and delivering items. This requires addresses, routes most traveled, and other information, and this is just the start. Imagine how much more advanced this technology will get, and how much we’d have to risk to take advantage of it.
What can I do?
It’s no secret that these voice assistants are amazing. Despite the feeling of intrusion, there are many satisfied customers. And those who are afraid wish they could use them without fear. There are a few things you can do to minimize the loss of your privacy.
Use the mute button. Most of these devices have physical mute buttons on them. You can temporarily turn off their ears by switching the mute button to “on.”
Delete your recorded data. All of your recordings can be found in each respective online database, and you can pick and choose which ones you want to delete. Or you can delete them all.
At the moment, those two options seem to be your best bet in staying secure while utilizing the assistants to their fullest potential.