To be freaked out a little by Amazon?

[GinNeeded]

I'd heard that smart phones listened in to conversations to target advertising but dismissed it as tinfoil hat territory. People must have googled stuff, browsed etc

I popped on Amazon last night and random stuff I had chatted to the kids about in the day was in the 'recommended for you' section.

Including but not limited to:
*Old fashioned fly sticky strip, liked I'd hung in the kitchen (whats that?
isn't that cruel mummy?)

*Bug zapper ( can we get an electronic fly trap, like a tennis bat)

*Chlorine filter (could we put our pet fish in the swimming pool on holiday?)

*Muffin cases (What can I use to make a rosette?)

*Plastic Sapphires (What are those blue jewels on the real plastic gold pirate treasure?)

None of the above was searched for at all.

I understand targeted adverts, I realise that when I actively go online I am leaving a foot print, but chatting crap with the kids?

Now I am concerned about what else it hears and where that information goes!

We don't have an Echo or voice activated thing-a-me bobs either.

AIBU to not have realised this?

My DS works in IT and therefore is not gullible nor is he tin hat brigade. He says it’s common knowledge that mobile phones do track what you say and target ads. Also it is a legal fact that devices such as Alexa not only listen to everything being said ( it has to in order to be voice activated ) but it also records your conversations - as proved when the transcripts from an Alexa device were subpoenaed in court.
www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/amazon-echo-murder-investigation-data-police-a7621261.html%3famp

I give up, I honestly do.

No matter how many times people have come on here not only telling you exactly how this happens and explaining it in detail, over and over again across multiple pages, there are still people posting 'its true, I talked about dogs and then got some adverts about dog beds, the big companies are spying on us...' and other associated drivel.

If there was ever an advertisment for teaching Critical Thinking as a required subject in secondary schools, this thread would be it.

Sayhello

Have you actually read that article?

It clearly states amazon echo and other devices only begin recording when the relevant 'wake command' is detected

Also it's classic newspaper bullshit. The words 'may' and 'could' are doing an awful lot of heavy lifting.

Once mumsnet had an advert on “What’s living in XTown like”. X town being where DH works but though I have obviously said the name out loud I had never googled it or mentioned it in a text or email

@PatriarchyPersonified - Yes I have and it also states they are ‘always in listening mode’ and doesn’t state how long they record for after waking - and the president of a security services company stated that smart devices are “storing more and more data on us”. Why do you expect me to accept what your are saying simply because you repeat your assertions, against what I am told by someone who works in the tech industry doing software development and app design? Of course Facebook aren’t going to hold up their hands and say ‘yep! You got us - soz!’

I am by no means a conspiracy theorist or tinhat person but without boring you with the details this has happened to me too many times for it to be coincidental or due to confirmation bias.

No amount of patronising by PP alters the fact that this does happen. Trying to argue that because you don't get adverts for everything you talk about to disprove the notion that you sometimes do is illogical.

Patti + Sayhello

Fine. You are right. I'm actually in on it.

There is a huge global conspiracy surrounding the secret collection of audio data from consumer devices.

Never mind that literally a GCSE level Computer Studies student can see exactly what data is sending and being received from their networks at any time. That's what they want you to think.

It's all part of the plan to risk enormous legal action and huge sums of compensation for breach of data protection regulations in numerous countries, in exchange for... slightly more access to your preferences in order to make their adverts a bit better? 🙄

I don't know why I get involved in these threads.

They go the same way every single time.

Who needs to speak to people who actually know what they are talking about. Just go with what you 'feel' instead.

I'm out.

Well, seeing that MZ covered his lens made me go and do the same just now.

I only use my phone and a notebook chrome and on these devices I don't use FB or the other things mentioned and I don't get adds targeted at things I've spoken about. However, my notebook and phone share my google search history even though I never formally linked them. And other people's google search histories have popped up on mine - 3 people, I knew them well enough to be able to identify it. It's an awkward phone call to say the least to let someone know they need to fix their privacy settings. Same thing happened with my work mobile where suddenly things I searched for work and things I search outside of work were showing on both gadgets, never having been formally linked. I had to go to IT to un-link my work phone.

Yes patriarch and because DS, being far more advanced than a GCSE student and knows about data mining, deliberately chose a subject which would never feature in any searches from our IP to demonstrate what happened - cat food - we have no pets, no cats, no related searches on anything to do with cats - no need for felix cat food which then appeared.
Companies are not risking legal action as the law has not kept up to date with smart technology advances and as such there are no laws to break yet. They just get caught, say sorry and change their policy as happened with the Cambridge analytical case.

Yes patriarch and because DS, being far more advanced than a GCSE student and knows about data mining, deliberately chose a subject which would never feature in any searches from our IP to demonstrate what happened - cat food - we have no pets, no cats, no related searches on anything to do with cats - no need for felix cat food which then appeared.
Companies are not risking legal action as the law has not kept up to date with smart technology advances and as such there are no laws to break yet. They just get caught, say sorry and change their policy as happened with the Cambridge analytical case.

I've had this before. My husband told me he wanted a Swatch watch and the next thing I knew I had Facebook ads for Swatch!

Dynamodopey I had the same thing happen to me last year when I went for a job interview. Got home and the interviewer appeared in my facebook friend suggestions. I was spooked and started a thread on here. Apparently it’s just because our phones were in the same vicinity.

What I want to know is: how come companies like amazon or social media can tailor their adverts to what you’ve been talking about, yet Facebook manages to completely fail to recommend “people you may know” to me. Literally zero mutual friends with any of them (most appear to be fake/MLMbots) yet people I actually have mutual friends with who live in a similar area/ are members of similar groups aren’t recommended? On what basis might I “know” Muhammad from Peru over and above Steve who lives up the road and is a member of two local selling pages?!

I’m highly unconvinced that devices listen to you. It would be very helpful if mine decided to- I might actually remember what I was going to look for then!!

I do not like fiat cars, I wouldn't want to own one and spent some time today while in my car just that. This evening there was a Fiat ad in my news feed. Something similar has happened too often for me to see it as a coincidence.

*telling my mum just that

Got home and the interviewer appeared in my facebook friend suggestions. I was spooked and started a thread on here. Apparently it’s just because our phones were in the same vicinity

I suspect the interviewer had searched your profile after your interview for a bit of background on you.

If it helps OP, my recommended items are the same as yours, fly paper, zapper, cheap blue jewellery... conspiracy theory is entirely possible

Ha ha! Yes Noparticularpattern, that IS the real question here!!!!!!

My DS works in IT and therefore is not gullible nor is he tin hat brigade.

This made me laugh. Does working in IT somehow preclude being gullible or believing in conspiracy theories! I.T it’s like MI5 you know

I'd bought a new swimming costume weeks ago and was going swimming for the 1st time since and tried it on as I wasn't sure about it anymore. I said to do, "do you think this is too low? I can't seem to find a decent swimming costume lately". Next time I went on the internet there was an add for swimming costumes. I'd not searched them for at least 3-4 weeks, and I know what ads are usually there.

Patriarchy before you go, why don't you offer your technical services to our national security agencies? They could be saving a lot of money, time and effort if they had the benefit of your advice instead.

If you already advise them then shame on you!

Patriarchy ok so there is no transfer of data over Wi-Fi, but the same effect could be gained by keywords being recognised and stored as data on your own device which is then accessed by the algorithms couldn't it? Basically a cookie.

Disclaimer, I have very limited knowledge on the subject and no opinion formed yet.

Mil went for an overnight stay in a city I've never visited or researched before. She stayed in a hotel I'd never heard of. She came to see us after she returned and just as she was leaving she happened to mention the hotels name. After she'd gone I went onto Facebook and that hotel was first in my list of adverts.
Absolutely huge coincidence?

Patriarchy, due to reading this I have just tried the same thing with my son and I, we both discussed this in a room well away from my smartphone, then sat in front of it simply discussing all sorts of strange rubbish... the phone came up with pretty much all of what we'd playfully talked about within a few minutes, so improbably the damn thing must be far more complex inside than I'd thought I'd paid for when buying the phone!

It IS more than a little worrying though, what else is it "recording" and where else is the info being sent to?? ( at my data expense no doubt!)

After she'd gone I went onto Facebook and that hotel was first in my list of adverts.
Absolutely huge coincidence?
No.
I'll bet you had the Facebook app running, with the mic enabled, so it was listening constantly for keywords.
That's what it does.