Even ex-Amazon boss won’t trust Alexa not to spy on him at home
Switch off device for privacy, he warns
IT sits in millions of homes listening for requests for everything from weather updates to shopping orders and even turning on ‘smart’ heating systems.
But Amazon’s digital assistant Alexa poses such a threat to privacy that even a former executive of the online giant has admitted he regularly turns his off to protect himself.
Robert Frederick, a former senior manager of Amazon Web Services, revealed that he disables the artificial intelligence-powered service whenever he wants a ‘private moment’.
Amazon admits that in an attempt to improve speech recognition, its staff
‘A threat people should take very seriously’
listen to some voice recordings from devices such as its Echo speakers that have Alexa built into them.
It is estimated more than two million UK households own these devices.
Whistleblowers have revealed that scores of workers in Costa Rica, India, Romania and the US listen to as many as 1,000 audio clips a day.
Some employees have admitted to sharing amusing recordings – such as a woman singing badly in the shower – with colleagues via an online chat room.
But they have also overheard bank details being read out and, in two harrowing instances, what sounded like a sexual assault, which workers were allegedly told to do nothing about.
Mr Frederick told last night’s BBC Panorama: ‘I turn off my Alexa whenever I want to have a private moment. I don’t want certain conversations to be heard by humans – conversations that I know for a fact are not things that should be shared… then I turn off those particular listening devices.’
James Marcus, who worked as a senior editor at Amazon for five years, said: ‘I hate the idea of voluntarily putting a bug into my living room.
‘Amazon has been collecting this data since 1996 on hundreds of millions of people. It’s sinister.’
Professor Shoshana Zuboff, of Harvard Business School, said: ‘[Amazon staff] have amassed so much knowledge about us… We are not customers, we are sources of raw material.’ Roger McNamee, a Silicon Valley investor, said: ‘The notion that a machine is listening all the time is a threat people should take very seriously. Yet all the evidence is that Alexa is a hit.’
Amazon said staff listen to less than 1 per cent of conversations to check the accuracy of the devices.
Customers can opt out of helping the firm ‘develop new features’ through privacy settings. Amazon’s Dave Limp said: ‘ We’re trying to make it easier to delete those recordings but the system does get better for you personally if you don’t do that.’