Aibu to be even more concerned about alexa

[Idobelieveinfairies2018]

Alexa had been a discussion in my house for a while. Dh wanted her but I was slightly concerned with privacy and also a little bit 'what's the point'.
Dh assured me that there was nothing to be worried about and explained all she can do. So we compromised and he bought a amazon fire tablet with Alexa. That was at Xmas, however, today he said to me "see nothing bad has happened so can we get the echo now?" I told him I wanted to research it a bit more and have done so.
To say I am VERY concerned by what I have read is an understatement. I thought perhaps these maybe conspiracy theories or written by ppl who had something 2 hide. Until I stumbled across a link about 3 essential privacy settings and it told me how to check what Alexia is recording.
Anyway, I followed the instructions and was (still am) horrified at wot i discovered.
There were recordings at least twice a week since her set up, at times when we did not 'wake' her.
Most are ok ie the TV programs we were watching or random snipits of conversations I don't remember having, BUT there are a few things that have been part recorded that are very private ie 1 from yesterday was me speaking 2 dh 'I need to phone my dealer for my drugs tomorrow' (its not wot u think, I was talking about the chemist and its a jokey thing between the 3 of us to lighten things up). There was also an incident a few weeks ago where I lost my temper in fear and shouted at the dog and was quite inappropriate, but the recording is of me shouting 'For fucks sake u stupid c* daddy gonna go mad' Now that is going to sound to anyone listening as if I was talking to my dd and could land me in serious trouble.
I have deleted these recordings now but do u think I'm bu in my concerns or is this not an issue? Ie is she perhaps malfunctioning (I do know that I haven't been aware of her responding to these 'voice commands', even with a 'sorry I didnt catch that' so maybe she is faulty?) Or should I trust my gut and refuse entry?

My colleague has the Google equivalent and was talking to her partner about something they were thinking of buying and she said later there were ads for the exact thing on her tablet. It wasn't 'on' and she said she definitely hadn't looked them up on her phone or tablet beforehand and had only been looking in the Argos catalogue.

I think they're creepy

I had some quite paranoid moments about ex reading my emails which we recovered from and I recognised as paranoia. So I already know I'm a bit prone to it. But I'm finding this freaky. I've just found the long long list of recordings. Lots of snippets of conversation, mainly my kids shouting over each other.

I'm loving Alexa a lot less....

wot if amazon got hacked Then some hackers would know the stuff you've already broadcast all over the internet yourself!

@some I think it is illegal to call ur child a cunt (that would be emotional abuse of a minor). U said u were quite concerned so I made a suggestion.
The difference would be that the tablet has mine & dh names and address where as nobody here knows me.
You say nobody will hear it but what happens if it had been the echo device and some1 in the vicinity decided 2 'drop in'? What happens if mine is the recording they pick randomly for training purposes? Too many unawnsered questions im afraid so she will not joining us and will be disabling the microphone thing as soon as dh gets bk

I guess I use it differently to others. We often have it on in the kitchen at breakfast time and dd has it on when she's playing with it but the rest of the time it's off. Dh and I aren't likely to be having a serious conversation next to it. It's a bit like the phone hacking thing - no one is going to want to listen to my hour long chats to my mum.

Sorry but not sorry, I can not take anyone who says ”horrified at wot i discovered.” seriously. You can see the word wot you deserve to be hung drawn and quartered!

I am astonished how popular these are... it's paying a company to install a listening device in your home.

You may not think you're that interesting etc but private data is a multibillion pound industry.

@some are u deliberately trying to provoke a reaction of some kind? Have I offended u in any way? What about the recordings that I didn't share on here? Or the 100s of times I've given my card details to make a phone payment, or more worringly the times I've phoned my bank and had to tell the bank the 1st, 3rd and 5th letters of my passcode? Most of the time when at home I make phone calls on speaker so quite easy for some1 to listen in & decode that

@Thejoyof apologise I did not realise I was applying for a job with my post or anything similarly formal.
But imo the grammar police deserve to be racked, hung, drawn and quartered
X

You called your dog a cunt?

I’m not so worried about my behaviour in my house that I think something would be recorded that was incriminating. It’s mostly just my family being nice to each other and not calling each other cunts.

@RippleEffects I read your post and immediately asked google assistant if they'd farted, she tried to blame the dog, I can see why your DS's keep asking.

I'm fine with the recording things but mine overheard a conversation where I said to my sister "tell DH bollocks" and DH got a text that just said bollocks.

Well your phone listens to you too. Bet there’s loads more information on your phone then Alexa can gather.
How do you think Facebook suggests friends? It can go through your contacts. What if apps can go through your private emails? Banking apps?
I think we re already on a slippery slope.
As long as data is only being gathered for commercial purposes, I’m not too phased by that. So what if amazon are trying to target ads at me?
I’m just concerned that we re setting up an infrastructure where it would be easy for a government to have everyone under surveillance one day in the future. Big Brother.

are u deliberately trying to provoke a reaction Me?! I'm just asking why the hysteria. If I was trying to provoke a reaction I'd post a paranoid rant about cunting at the dog and ringing my drug dealer. For that reason, I'm out.

Have switched mine off too after it randomly came on even though nobody said a word. It's crap and creepy. I'd take it to the charity shop if I could be sure it wiped all my data but otherwise it will end up in the bin before long.

No, you’re not applying for a job, but you should still use English. Slang is what I expect from a child or an idiot who can’t string an English sentence together!
No worries, your reply told me all I need to know about you.

This is all horrifying.

@marypoppins yes I did and I was ashamed of myself the minute I did so. I lost my temper through fear of wot would happen to him because of the amount of chocolate he'd consumed and where I was going to get the vet fees from.
I take it u don't discuss private things in ur house then? No mention of health conditions etc?

@daykay my phone does not listen to me as I have had that permission disabled. Which is what I now need doing on the fire tablet. Facebook rarely suggests people I know unless I have tagged them and as u said I'm not bothered if Argos or Wish want to bombard me with ads of things I've already looked at, and either already ordered or decided against.
But big brother does bother me quite a bit and I have already heard of law enforcement subpoenaing Alexa records in america.
X

I think it’s laughable that you’re here and, I assume, all over the internet with your passwords and bank details and addresses and photos of your kids and God knows what else and now suddenly after all these years you’re freaked. Just what do you think the internet has been doing all this time? Whatever it is you’re afraid of is already happening and has been for years. You’re either naive or daft.

law enforcement subpoenaing Alexa records in america.

Presumably in the same way the police check browser history to catch paedophiles?

Essentially, law abiding citizens should be fine but if you're doing drug deals or murdering people then switch Alexa off.

Unless you never google, don't use social media and don't have store cards you're very naive to think Alexa is big brother and by keeping it out of your house you're protected from direct marketing.

We have Alexa and since I'm home more than my DH is I made an executive decision to unplug it most of the time, I only plug it in when I want to listen to music basically.

Of course these devices are sucking up voice data! It's not a paranoid conspiracy theory to think so, this kind of information that consumers are providing for free is worth millions potentially in helping direct future products and services.

I have a google phone and phone service (Google Fi) and periodically I will go into settings and clear out history and yes indeed there are snippets of random conversations (not on the phone but in RL) that I've had being picked up by my phone which is positioned near me! Google has owned up to this happening so I guess it's my choice to have a google device. My DH works in a related techy field (we're in California) and you are naive if you don't think your habits/conversations that you freely provide can't collected and analysed. It mostly for product development though, not exactly the most sinister reasons but... it's still a step towards ever decreasing privacy IMO.

Oh dear it does amuse one terribly when people can give but cannot receive.

Anyway, thank u to those who have offered their experiences /advice. Dh is suitably irked that either he's being watched by aliens or his tablet is malfunctioning and Alexa is now not invading our home more than she already has
X

Hackers could surely switcg it on even when you think it's off remotely surely? Like cameras on laptops where they turn it on so can see you but you don't know. That would concern be more.

It's not CSI: Cyber!

I noticed yesterday that one of my colleagues has one switched on in his office, this is three months after his boss asked him to remove it (and the camera that he’d set up pointing at his door). God knows what it’s recorded.

Why is everyone so surprised at this? Im always like at threads like these. A device that is designed for recording people issuing commands and devices obeying them, the frontiers of these made and sold from data collecting giants Google and Amazon, and people are surprised when they record you? And unless you use the Internet 100% completely anonymously and/or have never used google, which, I would never believe, there’s data of your online activity that could be used to analyse. Someone above mentioned Cambridge Analytic that was the main news on Channel 4 and I watched it and in it someone said in this new world of online interaction, we, the public, are the product. It was in regards to politics persuasion but it fits here too in this thread I think.