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Original poster

Alexa has just whispered to me - freaked out.

237 replies

FavouritePJs · 04/12/2025 23:07

My Alexa has just whispered to me and I couldn’t understand what it said, I asked her to repeat and she told me there was nothing to repeat. I’ve played it back in the app and it sounded like a male saying “Alexa drop” it’s nobody in our house and we dont use Alexa drop. I have unplugged it but feel (stupidly) frightened by it. My husband is on a nightshift - I don’t think I’ll sleep. My daughter doesn’t seem to think that anyone can just drop in but if it wasn’t that, what was it?

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Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
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breezyyy · 05/12/2025 07:33

GrandmasCat · 05/12/2025 07:23

Everytime I use ChatGPT, I am less worried about the data that may be stored than the fact that we are training the “monster”.

I had a brief stint working with an AI development group at the time nobody believed computers could produce art… it took a short few weeks of early “genetic programming” before the thing could be better at image composition than an art student.

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I completely agree.

Vroomfondleswaistcoat · 05/12/2025 07:35

Mine mishears things all the time, she seems to get a lot from the TV.

DogPawsMudFur · 05/12/2025 07:40

I'm another one who works in Tech and won’t have one in the house.
Not least because I like that we (sometimes) still have to physically move our bodies to turn something on or off. I also like knowing how stuff works and I don’t want to outsource too much to a device - I’m boring in that I get excited about cables etc. My DH - a programmer - is even more against them than I am, for the more sinister reasons mentioned here. But in reality the main risk is dodgy code - totally agree with an OP about the human fallibility in software engineering. Though agentic AI is fast replacing humans there now. What a world we live in. Thankfully the simple pleasure and pride of lighting a fire to heat the house still very much lives on.

breezyyy · 05/12/2025 07:45

Amen to that @DogPawsMudFur

BurnoutGP · 05/12/2025 07:47

Your husband came home to stay with you to calm you down...because your Alexa whispered a word?? How do you manage to adult?

SapphireSeptember · 05/12/2025 07:49

ChristmasMantleStatue · 05/12/2025 07:28

Lord I am so glad I don't have an Alexa.

I had a colleague whose Alexa used to come on at 2 in the morning playing the song she played at her late teen son's funeral.

Turned out it was her arsehole ex (not the father of the deceased boy) sneaking around to her house, standing by the kitchen window and giving the Alexa instructions through the window. Imagine the kind of person you have to be to do that.

Bloody hell! What an arsehole!

Brokenmybody · 05/12/2025 07:50

Mine went off once randomly at 3.00 am spouting facts about Hilter 🤔

Bowies · 05/12/2025 07:52

It randomly happened to me recently too late at night. I agree it sounds really creepy in whisper mode.

Probably just a glitch. It makes mistakes or thinks you’ve alerted it when you haven’t sometimes.

AlexandraPeppernose · 05/12/2025 07:54

A few days ago I was sitting on the sofa by myself in silence, on my phone. Alexa next door in the kitchen suddenly said "I'm feeling opinionated. Ask me a question like do I like your hair."

It was most bizarre. I did actually say do you like my hair and it told me "it is definitely interesting" in a sarcastic tone.

I went on my Alexa app to find the origin and it said someone said something on one of the other devices but I was home alone.

Very strange.

NDornotND · 05/12/2025 07:56

I use Alexa almost exclusively to play BBC Radio 4, or very occasionally as a timer. We only have one and it's in the kitchen. Every now and then after I've said 'Alexa, stop' to turn the radio off, she says 'Goodbye'. That does freak me out slightly, as it seems very random and I clearly don't want to have a chatty relationship with the thing 😑

StrongTea · 05/12/2025 07:56

Ours suggested we might like to play calming music for dogs after the dogs had been barking very loudly. Obviously annoyed her.

Vroomfondleswaistcoat · 05/12/2025 07:56

They are definitely listening. I keep getting ads on Mumsnet about treating morning sickness and information about pregnancy sickness in general. I'm 65!! But my DIL has been suffering badly... and I've talked about it within Alexa's hearing.

But I live alone and I like having Alexa just in case I fall down the stairs or find myself unable to get out of bed or something- she can call for help for me if I can't reach my phone.

BunnyLake · 05/12/2025 07:59

DuchessDandelion · 04/12/2025 23:44

I won't have them in the house. The whole premise is sinister.

Me neither. Alexas and similar got scrapped in this house a few years ago.

breezyyy · 05/12/2025 07:59

AlexandraPeppernose · 05/12/2025 07:54

A few days ago I was sitting on the sofa by myself in silence, on my phone. Alexa next door in the kitchen suddenly said "I'm feeling opinionated. Ask me a question like do I like your hair."

It was most bizarre. I did actually say do you like my hair and it told me "it is definitely interesting" in a sarcastic tone.

I went on my Alexa app to find the origin and it said someone said something on one of the other devices but I was home alone.

Very strange.

How very presumptuous, cheeky cow!

Bowies · 05/12/2025 07:59

NDornotND · 05/12/2025 07:56

I use Alexa almost exclusively to play BBC Radio 4, or very occasionally as a timer. We only have one and it's in the kitchen. Every now and then after I've said 'Alexa, stop' to turn the radio off, she says 'Goodbye'. That does freak me out slightly, as it seems very random and I clearly don't want to have a chatty relationship with the thing 😑

You can change it in your settings so it minimally interacts with you. It will then stop saying goodbye!

Bowies · 05/12/2025 08:04

FavouritePJs · 05/12/2025 01:18

so I texted my husband and he’s popped home and had a listen and has managed to ascertain the voice is Scottish, which it is, I hadn’t noticed that until he pointed it out, but says it’s definitely interference. He’s obviously given me all of the highly correct logical explanations for it, but he keeps forgetting I have watched The Enfield Hauntings and UnCanny and therefore my mind is made up 🤣. He’s going to stay home for a bit in the hope I’ll calm down and get some sleep.

OP probably not the best idea to watch any more of these types things if you suffer from anxiety!

awakeandasleep · 05/12/2025 08:04

My Alexa woke me up at 3am playing loud music. I was so scared as my DH was on a night shift and I find it hard to sleep in the house alone.

HideousKinky · 05/12/2025 08:06

GoodQueenWenceslaus · 05/12/2025 07:32

How is it listening if it it's switched off?

What does your daughter say it is going to do with what it hears? Can't you just keep it out of the rooms where you might say anything confidential?

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Some years previously we were having a conversation about her employer (one of the big tech companies) in a room where there was an Alexa.

She raised her hand to indicate a pause when I asked her a question, crossed the room and switched it off before answering.

I said incredulously "Why did you do that? Is it listening?" and she just shrugged.

Her work is designing these things but I have always noticed she does not have one herself.
So yes, you can switch it off. I prefer, like her, simply not to have one

breezyyy · 05/12/2025 08:06

Bowies · 05/12/2025 08:04

OP probably not the best idea to watch any more of these types things if you suffer from anxiety!

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I agree with this. I realised at an early age that inviting scary stuff into your mind is a bad idea.

SparklyGlitterballs · 05/12/2025 08:08

We have one in the kitchen which is mostly used as a timer or to play music when cooking. Tell Alexa you love her, but in a way that sounds as though you mean it. She'll sing back to you.

Figsaregood · 05/12/2025 08:11

Reminds me of a certain sci-fi film..."I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that".

DogPawsMudFur · 05/12/2025 08:12

Personally I think we make a mistake humanising these devices. Obviously I know it’s a marketing ploy, and is very effective. It’s not a her and is not called Alexa. As I say to my kids, assume all online interaction (even here TBH) is with a creepy guy in from in a basement on the other side of the world, or on your street, whichever is more worrying.

breezyyy · 05/12/2025 08:13

Figsaregood · 05/12/2025 08:11

Reminds me of a certain sci-fi film..."I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that".

Such a bleak, bleak film.

HideousKinky · 05/12/2025 08:17

breezyyy · 05/12/2025 08:13

Such a bleak, bleak film.

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Except for the baby floating in a bubble through space to the Blue Danube which always lifts my heart!

Frankiecat2 · 05/12/2025 08:23

WonderingWanda · 05/12/2025 06:11

Ours is really boring, she just endlessly tells us the weather for the wrong place or that our parcel has arrived.

Mine does too.

or ‘suggests’ things I might like to buy (that I would never in a million years want to buy).