DO YOU TRUST ALEXA?

HAL 9000: “This mission is too important for me

to allow you to jeopardize it.”

According to a new study conducted by Edison Research; in association will NPR, Smart Speaker ownership and usage thats continue to grow. 

But, the report also says a large number of people don’t trust the security of these devices or motives of the companies that provide them.   

[Click here to download the report]

The telephone survey was conducted between December 31, 2019 and January 5, 2020, with 1,015 adults (age 18 and older) across the U.S participating.

According to the Edison/NPR survey, 24% of Americans now own a Smart Speaker, up from 21% in 2019. 

The majority of Americans – 76% - do not own one. Most of them say they never will.

Smart Speakers are part of a “voice revolution” led by companies that seek to have spoken-word commands be the new way to brew coffee, close the garage door or flush the toilet. But, there are fears that the devices can be used for surveillance and/or theft of important information.

The Edison/NPR survey found that around two-thirds of the people that don’t own Smart Speakers say they don't want the devices because they fear that someone is “listening to them."

Smart Speakers are becoming more sophisticated and there are concerns about even deeper intrusion in our everyday lives.

Judith Shulevitz wrote in the November 2018 issue of The Atlantic [link];

“Today, Alexa is a humble servant. Very soon, she could be much more—a teacher, a therapist, a confidant, an informant. Friends my age — we’re the last of the Baby Boomers — tell me they have no desire to talk to a computer or have a computer talk to them. Cynics of every age suspect their virtual assistants of eavesdropping, and not without reason.”

“Smart speakers are yet another way for companies to keep tabs on our searches and purchases. Their microphones listen even when you’re not interacting with them, because they have to be able to hear their “wake word,” the command that snaps them to attention and puts them at your service.”

Shulevitz says one reason that companies such as Amazon and Google are pushing voice-command system is because they have “a grand ambition” to monitor every day behavior at home, at work and in vehicles:

“The company that succeeds in cornering the smart-speaker market will lock appliance manufacturers, app designers, and consumers into its ecosystem of devices and services, just as Microsoft tethered the personal-computer industry to its operating system in the 1990s.”

ECHOES OF GEORGE ORWELL

George Orwell

In his book 1984, George Orwell warned of dictatorships using embedded monitoring devices to control society and even perceptions of reality:

“The telescreen [is a] never-sleeping ear. They could spy upon you night and day. [People] could be tracked down by inquiry. They could lay bare in the utmost detail everything that you had done or said or thought.”

According to the Edison/NPR survey people who have bought devices like Alexa are using them frequently. 

Voice-commands are part of the “new normal” whether people want it or not. The intentions may be good but they can be co-opted by more sinister forces.