Is Your Smart Phone Listening to You.

[Raven]

How invasive is your smartphone or Alexa?
It looks to me that if you carry the internet around with you on your phone, you can be located where ever you go and people can hear your conversations even when you are not using your smartphone but it silently sits by your side listening to everything that goes on around it.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-35639549

[Alex]

I don't think they'd be interested in my conversations about Morrisons offers but I guess if you had a sensitive job it could be a problem - if it's true !

[Michael Rolls]

I have an I-phone 5s and have never experienced anything like that
Mike

[klondike]

Maybe you need an upgrade? 

[Raven]

Maybe this is just a coincidence, but it's what got me thinking and prompted me to post.

A while back, my daughter was at her friend's house and the friend was saying she'd like to get a dog. The next thing, adverts for dog rescue and other dog-related adverts appeared on her phone via Facebook and other places.

[klondike]

It is a fact that "smart assistants" on speakers are constantly listening. They have to be. They also record much of what is said supposedly to "improve the user experience".

Android smart phones record everywhere you go. The Google Opinion Rewards app will present you with a paid question on whether you went into some of the shops you were near. I have no idea if Apple phones do but as Jobs treated his users as cash cows just on unit pricing alone I expect that they do.

Whether any of this matters to you depends on you. If you don't want it to happen flush your smart phone down the loo and either do without entirely or use a dumb Nokia style brick. Bin smart speakers too.

Me? I don't really care. I see virtually no adverts while at home as my network includes a PiHole which I have mentioned many times. While out and about I rarely take the phone out of my pocket anyway.

[Diasi]

Well I doubt that mine is as none of the apps have been granted permission to access the microphone phone or the camera.

Only the phone function has access to the microphone.

Our Alexa devices record everything that's been said after Alexa has been activated.

I could delete everything quite easily if I wanted to.