Prevent your speaker from eavesdropping
Six ways to make sure your private conversations remain that way
SAN FRANCISCO – After an Oregon family described the worst fear about owning an Amazon Echo come true — their smart speaker picked up a private conversation and then shared it with the outside world — you might ask: How can I prevent this from happening?
Aside from unplugging your smart speaker for good, there are some safeguards you can use if you’re one of the 40 million people who have these voice-activated speakers from Amazon or competitors Google Home and Apple HomePod.
In the Portland, Ore., family’s case, one of the several Alexa devices they had in their home misinterpreted conversations happening in the house as a command to first record a conversation and then send it as a message to a contact on the father’s contact list.
According to Amazon, Alexa twice asked for confirmation of the requests. The family didn’t hear the requests, perhaps because they volume was set too low, but Alexa heard the conversation — and interpreted the talk as a response to the voice software’s questions. Then it completed what it had determined was a request: Send a message to someone on your contact list.
“When the automobile was first introduced, or the airplane or the computer, it took time for us to understand the good and bad they came with.” Yoshi Kohno Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington
Here’s the problem: All the digital assistant and smart speaker makers, including Amazon, Google, Apple and Microsoft, are working to make their systems evermore sensitive, ready to hear the quietest command in the nosiest room and better able to guess the meaning of our sometimes mumbled words.
First, though, remember that while Alexa is always listening, it’s not always recording. Amazon’s voice recognition program is constantly listening for its “wake word,” the word that tells the system to pay attention, so it doesn’t record everything it hears.
Only when it hears its wake word does it begin sending what you say to the cloudcomputer server, where it’s recorded so it can be translated into commands.
You can see all the stored commands you’ve given it by going into your Alexa app and looking at settings and then history, where you’ll see all interactions you’ve had with Alexa. You can also delete this history by going to the Amazon website through the accounts and lists settings.
If you want to minimize the chances Alexa will misinterpret something you say and inadvertently eavesdrop on you, here are some tips:
❚ Set a different wake word: In Alexa’s case, there are four possible wake words — Alexa, Echo, Amazon or Computer. You can test to see which one results in fewer inadvertent Alexa wake-ups in your household.
❚ Turn up the volume: This is one of those doubleedged sword problems. Many people turn down the volume on their Echos because they don’t want to bother others in the household. This can mean that if Alexa says something to confirm a question you might not hear it, especially if you’re not close to the speaker. Though it’s not clear that’s what happened in the Portland family’s case.
❚ Say no to Contacts: Many programs ask if they can access your Contacts. Your default should be, “No thank you,” unless there’s a strong reason for doing so.
❚ Turn it off: You can turn off Alexa’s microphone on the Echo and Dot by pressing the microphone button. This is an actual switch and not just an electronic command, so it can’t be circumvented by someone hacking into the device.
❚ No voice purchases: You can avoid having to make returns by either disabling Purchase by Voice or setting a PIN number so that only by saying the number can something be purchased. Both can be accessed in the Settings and then Voice Purchasing portion of the Alexa app.
❚ Don’t drop in: One function on Alexa that can be fun is the ability to “drop in” on a permitted contact’s device and hear (and see, with a Show or Dot) the person on the other end. You can set the Drop In feature so it only allows permitted contacts, only people in your household or no one at all. To set that, go into your Amazon app, click on the specific device you want to set and scroll down to Communications, then set the toggle to the level of availability you want.
Keep in mind, Alexa only debuted at the end of 2014. So many of the kinks are still being worked out, said Yoshi Kohno, a professor of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington.
“When the automobile was first introduced, or the airplane or the computer, it took time for us to understand the good and bad they came with,” he said. “The consequences aren’t all clear yet.”