this post was submitted on 02 Dec 2024
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Hasn't this been proven to be false? People have monitored the network traffic and phones don't listen like this; it's just not practical.
Instead, they keep track of your browsing, location, contacts, etc and build a profile well enough they don't need to listen to you.
It’ll vary by the software you have, and the phone you have. Many companies have been caught capturing microphone recordings such as Google, Meta and Amazon over the years to name a few.
It also depends on the appliances you own, and how you have them configured. TVs, Alexa, hell we even have refrigerators that have live mics on them now.
I have worked for tech my whole life, this is table stakes for these organizations, ethics be damned.
My understanding is the mics aren't "live" until the activation phrase is said, then they record and send that data for processing. If someone has proven otherwise I'd love to see their methods.
The scary thing isn't that they're listening, it's that they collect so much other data that they don't have to.
How are they listening for the activation phrase then?
I'm sure you'll find some good explanations online, but there's an "activation" circuit on the device "listening" that then engages the rest of the system when it's triggered. So there's no recording or sending of data until the activation phrase has been said, and the activation phrase detection is done locally on the device.
This makes sense for devices like Google home where there is only one activation phrase but I don't understand how an IC could exist that can respond to custom activation phrases.
Also are you saying that cellphones have this circuit too? I'm pretty darn sure that's all software based.
the "it doesnt record you until the software decides so" argument is such a bullshit. does not mke any difference. it listens when it wants, and you cant even verify it
Run your own experiments. That's all I am suggesting.
It'd be very easy to take some LLM text about some product, run it through a text to speech converter then quietly expose the phone to it (like put a earbud up to the mic). This way you could easily create a blind or a double blind test, you don't know what product that this set up has been rambling about into the phone for the past twelve hours and you have to pick it out from the ads you're served.
You don't need to transmit the recording. Maybe not even a transcript. Just the keywords.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/10/my-phone-listening-me