Ever wonder if your phone or smart TV is listening to your every word? Well it is.

Ever wonder why right after talking to your spouse about something in your own home and the next thing you notice is an add for the very thing you where talking about popping up on your computer? Ever wonder if your phone or smart TV is listening to your every word? Well it is.

MSN.com: "Is this even legal?" A leaked pitch reveals marketing agency uses 'Active Listening' software to eavesdrop on calls and push curated Facebook and Google ads

"We know what you're thinking. Is this even legal? It is legal for phones and devices to listen to you. When a new app download or update prompts consumers with a multi-page term of use agreement somewhere in the fine print, Active Listening is often included."

We had a thread on this already:

https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/off-topic-discussion/your-devices-could-actually-be-listening-to-your-conversations-now/260691/page1/

From what's been discovered so far they didn't actually get this thing to market before it was discovered and shut down. The NPUs required to put this capability in a phone app in a way that wouldn't be easily discoverable through black-box testing had only hit the market just before the initial leaks.

In reply to GameboyRMH :

Thanks for the link. I can't believe I missed that thread but I do remember having RSV and double pneumonia around that time last December. I will post my news article over to that thread and this one can be abandoned.

There was a book written in 1948, predicting that very thing. 
Horrible writer, in my opinion, but some folks considered it profound. 

Yes and??  At least someone does, because my wife certainly doesn't...

Nope. Always known, always warned against it, always called a crackpot or a conspiracy theorist for warning against it. Or worse, usually hit with "well I have nothing to hide so what do I need privacy for?"

Wait until people figure out their videocamera doorbells, or even worse the idiots that use them inside their houses, are all stored on public clouds and are entirely to easy to get ahold of. 

In reply to GameboyRMH :

Don't forget, by the time this stuff goes public, the next generation is already out and being used. DARPA projects also run about 20 years ahead of publicly useable tools, from the Internet as far back as 1965, to weapons, to WiFi in the 80s, to spy tools of all sorts, including hardware changes at the factory level. 

In reply to VolvoHeretic :

No, I never wondered.  I always assumed it was.

Duke said:

In reply to VolvoHeretic :

No, I never wondered.  I always assumed it was.

 

That's where I'm at. It definitely concerns me, and I don't have an Alexa, a Smart TV or a doorbell camera as a result, but I carry a cell phone with me everywhere, so I assume it's collecting all kinds of fun data on me, whether actual active listening or just robbing every piece of data up to that point (location, app usage, purchases, etc. etc.)

Sucks, but I like the convenience of the internet, email and music library all in my pocket.