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Google & Facebook partner admits it can listen to device microphone to serve ads - Dexerto (www.dexerto.com)

submitted 2 months ago by Stopthatgirl7 to c/technology

80 comments fedilink hide all child comments

A media firm that has worked with the likes of Google and Meta has admitted that it can target adverts based on what you said out loud near device microphones.

Media conglomerate Cox Media Group (CMG) has been pitching tech companies on a new targeted advertising tool that uses audio recordings collected from smart home devices, according to a 404 Media investigation. The company is partners with Facebook, Google, Amazon, and Bing.

In a pitch deck presented to Google, Facebook, and others in November 2023, CMG referred to the technology used for monitoring and active listening as “Voice Data.” The firm also mentioned using artificial intelligence to collect data about consumers’ online behavior.

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[–] zecg 8 points 2 months ago (1 children)

When it comes to Android, this should be standard. You can block all the bullshit with a few clicks, some apps don't need internet access at all (such as the fucking keyboard, Google).

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Obligatory FUTO keyboard recommendation. I liked Swiftkey - but not enough to defend the idea of an online keyboard.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

Oh wow. This seems to do exactly what I've been looking for. Works with nordic languages, and with a longtap layer for numbers and symbols, so for my purposes seems perfect at a glance.

[–] CairhienBookworm 2 points 2 months ago

Whoa this is cool, but I'm finding the voice to text to be quite buggy. Sometimes it works and other times all I get a bunch of emojis and weird symbols??

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

The only problem I have with it is that it doesn't have support for 12-key Japanese input.

[–] zecg 0 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The only problem I have with it is that it doesn’t have support for 12-key Japanese input.

Tried it now, it's really great but doesn't have the full pc layout that includes our accursed Č,Ć,Š.Đ diacritics. I'm actually really satisfied with my jugaad solution - downgraded version of gboard, frozen in time and cut off from the internet by Rethink VPN. There's no reason to update it, really, which is lucky since newer versions start randomly lagging if they can't reach google's fucking servers.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Why not just use actual Gboard and revoke its internet permissions?