Alexa, are you recording this?
A couple’s private conversation was mysteriously recorded by their Amazon Echo device and sent to one of their contacts, igniting privacy concerns about the voice-activated gadgets the online retailer wants to make as commonplace in homes as televisions.
The couple found out about it when they received a phone call two weeks ago from one of the husband’s employees telling them to “Unplug your Alexa devices right now. You’re being hacked,” news station KIRO 7 reported. Amazon said in a statement to the station that it was an “extremely rare occurrence.”
The Portland, Ore., couple used Amazon’s voice-activated devices throughout their home to control heat, lights and the security system, according to the news report.
Apparently, one of the Echo devices in their house had silently sent recordings to the caller, without the family’s permission. The person, who happened to be an employee of the husband, was in the family’s contact list.
“My husband and I would joke and say, ‘I’d bet these devices are listening to what we’re saying,’” a woman who identified herself only by her first name, Danielle, told KIRO 7, a local news station covering Seattle and western Washington state.
“We unplugged all of them and he proceeded to tell us that he had received audio files of recordings from inside our house,” she said. “At first, my husband was, like, ‘No you didn’t!’ And the (recipient of the message) said ‘You sat there talking about hardwood floors.’ And we said, ‘Oh gosh, you really did hear us.’ ”
Danielle said she felt invaded after listening back to her own conversations. “I’m never plugging that device in again,” she said. “I can’t trust it.”
Amazon told KIRO 7 in a statement, “Amazon takes privacy very seriously. We investigated what happened and determined this was an extremely rare occurrence. We are taking steps to avoid this from happening in the future.” It was not clear what type of Echo device was involved.
In 2014, Amazon introduced the new line of devices, which can also stream music and order goods from Amazon via voice command. It has been busy introducing updated versions and adding features to sell more devices than rivals like Alphabet and Apple, which are rolling out their own versions.
People have been willing to overlook glitches in the Echo, like it turning on accidentally or without the wake word being uttered, said Ryan Calo, an associate law professor at the University of Washington who researches how law applies to technology.
This incident is more alarming since a private conversation was recorded and sent to a third party, he said.
“Think about how uncomfortable the millions of people who own these things now feel,” Calo said. “The real harm is the invasion into solitude people now experience in their homes.”