Am I completely crazy or AIBU getting rid of Alexa?

[Konicek007]

Hello, call me paranoid but..would like some opinions.
We have Alexa Echo dot in the living room, purely because of the music, we not use it for anything else. We love it playing music through it. Hi
Yesterday me and my daughter ( 8 yrs) were having a conversation , her telling me about her horse toy she not longer wants, saying something in lines she doesn’t want to play with it anymore as she is too big now, to get rid of it etc..
Suddenly Alexa buttered in saying something like You are being warn and reported etc. We haven’t heard the message clear as we also had a music playing from radio.
None of us used the woke up word Alexa for her to respond, plus the music was playing in background but we did heard her saying about warning us..
Now I heard stories about these speakers are actually spying on your home but I never believed it.
My friend husband works for well know computer company as IT developer and he always kept saying to avoid these things in our home.
Now I’m actually paranoid and thinking to get rid of Alexa.
Your opinions please. ( don’t laugh)

You don’t have to have an Alexa in your home. We don’t. I have a decent Bluetooth speaker. Much better sound quality anyway. It’s waterproof and I can take it everywhere.

I also know someone that works for Amazon in this area and that’s all I’m saying.....

OP of course you can get rid of it

I wouldn't have that in my home. I also can't see the point tbh, unless you are disabled or struggle to get up for other reasons.

I would actually feel sorry for any employee listening
I understand why you think like this but you are missing the point, there is no employee listening, it's about gathering data so that people can be precisely profiled, their behaviour predicted so they can be controlled and manipulated there is no one listening, this is all done by computer algorithms.
It's not just about selling you things it's also about controlling elections, or imagine if a health insurance company insists that you wear a device that tracks how much exercise you do, exactly what you eat and then you are penalised and refused health care because you don't follow their rules?
The purpose of the surveillance state is to control the population

what's so hard about putting music on using your phone/ipad. don't get this Alexa thing id never have one.

Its interesting that Whatsapp was historically very secure until Facebook bought it. The platform developer left because after selling it & trying to work with fb he was frustrated that the encryption was being eroded in order to put adverts on.

Get rid of it. The data is all kept and stored. The most value thing you own now is your personal information and people who think that the big companies like Google would never misuse our information to benefit their profits are mugs.

Oh my god, I wish mine did listen...Alexa, Alexa, ALEXA (screaming at it now) I think it purposely ignores me as it has no problem with my boyfriend's voice!
People are maybe a bit paranoid, like someone said, it's a robot, like anyone is actually listening to my very dull conversations!

I'd never buy one and refuse to have one in the house.

Amazon have admitted that their employees are paid to listen to them.

www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/amazon-alexa-echo-listening-spy-security-a8865056.html

@UYScuti and you're missing the point that Alexa isn't always listening to everything you say.
They're set up so that they listen for a specific word, "Alexa", and once they hear that word only then do they record and upload your commands to the amazon servers. Amazon does not have recordings of everything you ever say. People have verified this by checking how Alexa uses their Internet - unless you have just said Alexa, no data is uploaded.

I've only read the first few responses. Even if you are 'being listened to all the time', who on earth is going to pay someone (millions of people) to sit there and listen to millions of mundane conversations? No one. Yabu.

I don’t care it’s listening. I would actually feel sorry for any employee listening to my vanilla conversations and singing show tunes at the top of my voice and telling the cat to stop being a dick.

That's all fine until something you believe is made illegal, and your private conversations are used against you. It's already happening in China.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance_in_China

I actually find it quite funny when I hear Alexa has made sudden announcements

I wish I could hack in to some of the people in my block of flats to say "Dude, STFU already" in a really loud scary voice

especially the guy downstairs who likes to yell on his mobile all summer long with the windows wide open.

Even if you are 'being listened to all the time', who on earth is going to pay someone (millions of people) to sit there and listen to millions of mundane conversations? No one. Yabu.

Amazon have already admitted that they do this. What other proof do you need?!

In fact they do employ people to listen as has been reported, So called AI learning but not nice

who on earth is going to pay someone (millions of people) to sit there and listen to millions of mundane conversations? No one. Yabu.

so cute.

We had a post here early where an unwanted visitor shouted Alexa swith the lights on, Alexa switch on alarm, how very annoying it worked

Amazon have admitted that their employees are paid to listen to them.

Listening to commands that you have willingly given to Alexa in order to improve the voice recognition is in no way the same as listening to your every word!

That's like saying that mumsnet is logging every word you ever type in a comment box, regardless of whether you hit "Post" or not.

I wish I could hack in to some of the people in my block of flats to say "Dude, STFU already" in a really loud scary voice

A bit of online hokery pokery will help you do just that

There is a thread on MN about a boyfriend outside the house getting the lights turned on and setting an alarm to wake the person in bed.
So if your door was linked, he could have opened it, or ordered goods.

It's like those 23andme DNA kits and similar - that information is being keep and stored. Why should you be bothered? Because the woman who owns it is married to Mr Google. They have interests and investments everywhere including the big health providers in the world. How useful would it be for health insurers to know the likelihood of someone getting a particular disease, or carrying faulty genes before deciding whether or not to give them health cover?
23andMe have just partnered to share their information with the world's biggest pharma company - GSK. To save the world? No, to make $300 million...
This isn't paranoia, this is all happening now and we are willingly throwing our information out to companies who are constantly looking for ways to monetize it.

There's a reason that every single person working in Tech uses covers on their laptops that block the camera.

time.com/5349896/23andme-glaxo-smith-kline/

Listening to commands that you have willingly given to Alexa in order to improve the voice recognition is in no way the same as listening to your every word!

But Alexa has to be listening all the time, otherwise "she" won't know when you're saying Alexa! That's the point. Don't be so naive that Amazon has sold you Alexa for your benefit. That's not what companies do.

They may claim they're not listening all the time, but they have to be, otherwise they won't work. How are they supposed to know you're "waking" them up if they can't hear every word you're saying?

I couldnt give a toss, i have 5 of them also have a docking station so i can take it outside/bathroom etc. Bil has about the same and he works in it and doesnt seem bothered by them

It's funny that this has come up on a social media forum. I bet I could harvest more data about most mumsnet users from their posts, than an amazon employee could from random snippets of "Alexa, turn the light on, hey did you get ham for din-"

m.youtube.com/watch?v=QL4bz3QXWEo
Published on Sep 23, 2019
She’s a Harvard professor and celebrated scholar who has been described as “the true prophet of the information age.”
Shoshana Zuboff’s new book looks at the exploitation of the digital dream and its rapid mutation into what she has coined – surveillance capitalism.

A mutant form of capitalism where tech giants like Facebook and Google are spying on users and manipulating our data to exploit and predict behaviours – in what is a serious threat to our freedom and privacy.
Matt Frei talked to her about some of the ideas of her book: The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power.