• Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      Is it any different than speaking in front of your smartphone?

      I don’t own an echo or Google whatever but I’ve definitely mentioned things and then got ads for that thing within the hour/day. Like cat litter when I don’t even own a cat, just mentioned it once for cleaning up spills.

      • Seudo@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        More likely there’s a bunch of data points it can use. Coming within BT range of someone who does have a cat for example. Otherwise all the major smart phone companies would need to be in collision to keep the secret because the battery drain would be so blatant of it was recording, processing, transfering etc.

        • cor315@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          And all the articles that have said they aren’t recording everything, I guess they would have to be in on it too.

    • sebinspace@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Yeah, don’t go looking too hard whenever you’re in a hospital or anything. The number of vulnerabilities I can spot with as little infosec knowledge I have is deeply concerning

    • ThatFembyWho@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      1 year ago

      Dentist office I went to has a private room with an Echo, they use it to switch playlists without having to touch anything, I guess. Figure they didn’t really think it through…

      But yeah I was a bit uncomfortable with that. Not that anything private was discussed, I simply had a cavity filled. They’re excellent dentists tho, best I’ve ever seen, so I won’t be going elsewhere.

      • redcalcium@lemmy.institute
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        1 year ago

        Maybe mention the potential privacy issue if they’re still using echo on your next visit. They might’ve not aware of it.

  • PeterPoopshit@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    IoT and smart device security only means your data is protected from unauthorized access. It’s up to the manufacturer, not the user to decide who can get in.

  • DogMuffins@discuss.tchncs.de
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    1 year ago

    You’re all missing the real kicker here - this sign is only here for the HIPAA auditor. Everyone knows that no one is actually going to mute the thing.

    • TWeaK@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      Also muting it probably doesn’t stop it listening, it just stops its response.

      • FooBarrington@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        No, there is a button to make the Echo stop listening.

        If you want to prove me wrong, it should be incredibly easy to press the button and record the Echos network activity. If you’re right you’d still see network traffic. But nobody has been able to show this so far. I wonder why?

        • TWeaK@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          Yeah I read the other comments after making mine. However everyone keeps calling it a “physical” button, and I don’t think that’s accurate. It won’t be a physical switch that opens a circuit, it will be a button that operates a transistor that opens the circuit.

          Still, I see no good reason to trust the device - especially in a medical setting.

          • calcopiritus@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            There’s not much difference between a direct switch and a transistor, both will cut the signal and neither is over rideable by software

            • Piranha Phish@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              This is disingenuous at best and incorrect at worst. The mute button on the Echo is just that, a button; it is not a switch. It is software-controlled and pushing it just sends a signal to the microcontroller to take some action. For instance, one action is to turn on the red indicator light; that’s definitely not physically connected to the mute button.

              Maybe another response of pushing the button is to disable the transistor used for the microphone, but it’s more likely that it just sets a software flag for the algorithm to stop its processing of the microphone input signal. Regardless of which method it uses, the microcontroller could undoubtedly just decide to revert that and listen in, either disabling or not disabling the red light at the same time.

              But I personally don’t think it listens in when muted. I don’t think it spies on us to target ads based on what we say around it. I’m not worried that the mic mute function doesn’t work as intended.

              But I fully understand that it is fully capable of it, technically speaking.

  • Devouring@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    It’s fascinating how people know that these devices break their privacy, yet they keep using them.

      • SolarMech@slrpnk.net
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        1 year ago

        Professionals should care about their client’s privacy though. That shouldn’t be a debate.

      • HughJanus@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        People that don’t care about their privacy is exactly what makes it so hard to just exist privately. I shouldn’t have to give up my rights because other people don’t care about them