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Citations please. Not because I think you're definitely fear mongering, but because real evidence would be important to see.

by mdpye 6y ago

strogonoff 6y ago
An owner of a Google-branded Android phone demonstrated it to me last year, it worked remarkably fast. IIRC, the example chosen was Google News. I can’t see how this is fear mongering. Device was not acting against owner’s will: that person specifically does not tighten relevant privacy settings and enables always-on mic because they see useful content suggestions as a feature. It is different from my outlook (and I take it yours too), but I think that point of view deserves the right to exist. The issue is that now when I am talking to someone like that in real life, I know I may be implicitly agreeing that Google would pick up my speech as well. It’s a clash similar to one between a person (e.g., my mom) who grants messenger apps full access to their phone’s address book for convenience, and their contact (e.g., myself) who does not want their information to be shared with Facebook et al. Addendum: a cursory search confirms this experience. — https://www.vice.com/en/article/wjbzzy/your-phone-is-listening-and-its-not-paranoia https://www.vice.com/en/article/wjbzzy/your-phone-is-listeni... — https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/your-smartphone-listening-or-coincidence/ https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/your-smartphone-listening-or-c... (2019) — https://www.quora.com/Does-Google-listen-to-my-conversations-to-push-ads-to-me https://www.quora.com/Does-Google-listen-to-my-conversations... (the first answer does not mention ads, but others share similar experience to what I saw) — Counterpoint: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-49585682 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-49585682 “phones that secretly listen to us are a myth” (2019). Notably, with all my respect for BBC, this article lacks a lot of context (did they turn off voice activation before testing? what were their privacy settings?), and to test devices listening they played commercials in presence of the phone rather than using voice (I have relatively high confidence that modern devices can easily distinguish between speech nearby and sound from a commercial before recording leaves the phone). Some sources claim that as of last year Google is changing the way their apps work. Not sure if they stop listening or stop showing relevant content. (I don’t personally own an Android phone, and even if I did I would have turned off virtual assistants & disabled always-on mic just as I do with my iPhone, so I wouldn’t be able to present first-hand proof.)
- BoorishBears 6y ago
  This is fear mongering because you literally have no credible proof.
  - strogonoff 6y ago
    Feel free to take it or leave it.
    - BoorishBears 6y ago
      As you can see I've chose option C: Calling it out as the fear mongering that it is. Maybe read up on the concept of "extraordinary claims requiring extraordinary evidence"
- chrisrhoden 6y ago
  What's described in the article is hotword-activated? So not at all what GP is supposing. If you say "Hey Google, tell me about toilet paper" and get ads for toilet paper, that's a fairly understandable cause => effect, but there are persistent anecdotes about conversations manifesting in ads where no hotword activation occurs (typically about Facebook.) Every company vehemently denies this is possible.
  - fiddlerwoaroof 6y ago
    I find this hard to believe because I’d think constant voice recognition would either have a noticeable impact on battery life or it’d have a major impact on data usage. Also, on iOS at least, it’d have to be provided by Apple, to be a constant background thing, and then Apple would already be using it for Siri.
    - strogonoff 6y ago
      If always-on mic for virtual assistant activation is enabled, it does impact battery life. Regarding iOS, I hadn’t observed ads obviously based on what I spoke about in presence of my iPhone, but then I don’t use voice-activated Siri and generally tighten up privacy settings.

Citations please. Not because I think you're definitely fear mongering, but because real evidence would be important to see.

by mdpye 6y ago

Citations please. Not because I think you're definitely fear mongering, but because real evidence would be important to see.

strogonoff 6y ago

An owner of a Google-branded Android phone demonstrated it to me last year, it worked remarkably fast. IIRC, the example chosen was Google News. I can’t see how this is fear mongering. Device was not acting against owner’s will: that person specifically does not tighten relevant privacy settings and enables always-on mic because they see useful content suggestions as a feature. It is different from my outlook (and I take it yours too), but I think that point of view deserves the right to exist. The issue is that now when I am talking to someone like that in real life, I know I may be implicitly agreeing that Google would pick up my speech as well. It’s a clash similar to one between a person (e.g., my mom) who grants messenger apps full access to their phone’s address book for convenience, and their contact (e.g., myself) who does not want their information to be shared with Facebook et al. Addendum: a cursory search confirms this experience. — https://www.vice.com/en/article/wjbzzy/your-phone-is-listening-and-its-not-paranoia https://www.vice.com/en/article/wjbzzy/your-phone-is-listeni... — https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/your-smartphone-listening-or-coincidence/ https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/your-smartphone-listening-or-c... (2019) — https://www.quora.com/Does-Google-listen-to-my-conversations-to-push-ads-to-me https://www.quora.com/Does-Google-listen-to-my-conversations... (the first answer does not mention ads, but others share similar experience to what I saw) — Counterpoint: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-49585682 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-49585682 “phones that secretly listen to us are a myth” (2019). Notably, with all my respect for BBC, this article lacks a lot of context (did they turn off voice activation before testing? what were their privacy settings?), and to test devices listening they played commercials in presence of the phone rather than using voice (I have relatively high confidence that modern devices can easily distinguish between speech nearby and sound from a commercial before recording leaves the phone). Some sources claim that as of last year Google is changing the way their apps work. Not sure if they stop listening or stop showing relevant content. (I don’t personally own an Android phone, and even if I did I would have turned off virtual assistants & disabled always-on mic just as I do with my iPhone, so I wouldn’t be able to present first-hand proof.)

BoorishBears 6y ago
This is fear mongering because you literally have no credible proof.
- strogonoff 6y ago
  Feel free to take it or leave it.
  - BoorishBears 6y ago
    As you can see I've chose option C: Calling it out as the fear mongering that it is. Maybe read up on the concept of "extraordinary claims requiring extraordinary evidence"
chrisrhoden 6y ago
What's described in the article is hotword-activated? So not at all what GP is supposing. If you say "Hey Google, tell me about toilet paper" and get ads for toilet paper, that's a fairly understandable cause => effect, but there are persistent anecdotes about conversations manifesting in ads where no hotword activation occurs (typically about Facebook.) Every company vehemently denies this is possible.
- fiddlerwoaroof 6y ago
  I find this hard to believe because I’d think constant voice recognition would either have a noticeable impact on battery life or it’d have a major impact on data usage. Also, on iOS at least, it’d have to be provided by Apple, to be a constant background thing, and then Apple would already be using it for Siri.
  - strogonoff 6y ago
    If always-on mic for virtual assistant activation is enabled, it does impact battery life. Regarding iOS, I hadn’t observed ads obviously based on what I spoke about in presence of my iPhone, but then I don’t use voice-activated Siri and generally tighten up privacy settings.