hi, ive had an echo show for a couple of months, its on in the kitchen during the day, last night we were talking about a friend who is going to Brighton to have a major operation, this morning one of alexas on screen suggestions was to ask what the weather was like in Brighton, so tin foil hat time?
Jury is out and google/amazon claim they don’t monitor audio for targeted adverts but I’m not convinced. The other week, had friends round who were talking to us about a house extension and problems with a new staircase…couple of days later I had a facebook ad appear for a staircase.
too much of a coincidence for me, google i belive suggests local resorts so to us would be places like whitby, scarborough, redcar, why the hell Brighton!
Will not have any of these 'smart' devices in the house.
When you look long into an abyss, the abyss looks long into you.........
Not sure about Alexa but several times after chatting to a friend ,subjects and products we’ve been talking about appear on their iPhone via FB ads - coincide?
I often catch her indoors shouting "Cartier, Gucci, Louboutin, diamonds!" at Alexa
Everyone should watch this.
Don't just do something, sit there. - TNH
^^^^ This.Originally Posted by Chris_in_the_UK
"Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it's enemy action."
'Populism, the last refuge of a Tory scoundrel'.
It's been proven by some Youtube guy. He had a put on spurious conversation with a mate about dog toys and within 24hrs was getting ads on his equipment offering dog toys. I wouldn't have one myself.
Wouldn't have any of these in my Alexa thingys in my house.
+1
I think evidence speaks for itself. I regularly get targeted ads within days few of specific conversations I have had on a subject.
Seems to happen across FB/Google and others, so now assume they all listen and collate info
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What about your Apple Watch
Sorry this part just made me laugh
I'm surprised nobodies asked it for a Daytona at RRP.
The smart devices are only the tip of it, your phone listens too
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For sale
They all data mine Alexa , phone et all but sorry got to go my Russian Twins have just turned up.
Thanks Alexa
I FEEL LIKE I'M DIAGONALLY PARKED IN A PARALLEL UNIVERSE
Chortle!They all data mine Alexa , phone et all but sorry got to go my Russian Twins have just turned up.
Thanks W Alexa
I’m sure it’s mainly linked to FB - I don’t partake on any social media - but a friend who has FB constantly get ad contain items we’ve discussed
Some of the more recent Echo devices have a mic switch, for those who are uncomfortable that Amazon are monitoring their everyday conversations. I sort of doubt they are, but I think I'll try an experiment. Over the course of the next few days, I'll repeatedly mention within listening range of my desktop Dot something that I wouldn't normally mention or type into Google or Amazon, and see if Amazon try to sell me one.
Spoke to the wife about some bubble wrap, and a garden hose and both appeared on FB ads (this was for legit and legal purposes honestly).
I have a number of Dots around the house and we all have smart phones and really don’t care if they do use our conversations for marketing purposes as with cookies, trackers etc when surfing the WWW.
Unless you want to live in the 1980’s, silent monitoring is part of our lives now.
B
Last edited by bomberman; 8th June 2021 at 21:25.
TBF, if after all those years of privacy breach reports and surveillance scandals you use that kind of big tech products (and services), you deserve to have crap spied out of you, and then some. At this point, only the folks who are too tech-illiterate to make informed choices can be excused.
I'd rather live in the 60's :0)
Each to their own, but I don't feel the need to jump on every tech bandwagon.
I don't, for example, 'do' Twitter or Instagram - I tried the former and hated it and I've never understood the concept of the latter, so I don't need it. I do have a Facebook account, it's useful for a number of purposes, but that's why I use it, not because it's 'essential'.
I don't see any need at all for one or more of these devices - I can get out my phone and type in a search if I want to.
If I want to buy something I'll actively search for it - I can't say I like the idea of something 'listening' to my every conversation and then using that for whatever purpose the provider desires.
There's a bit of fuss at the moment about the NHS selling medical information for research, but if Amazon and Google ARE listening in on your conversations, there seems to be nothing at all to stop them selling information about your health to insurance companies and the like, without any oversight.
Now, I guess it's possible my phone is 'listening' as well, but I've yet to find a 'need' for a gadget I can shout at (I have the wife for that!)
Of course, I get a lot of "You may be interested in" ads for used size 12 hiking boots and secondhand clothing after browsing SC!
M
PS In answer to another question, I don't have a smart TV either, although I do have a Virgin TV box connected to a dumb TV.
Last edited by snowman; 10th June 2021 at 10:05.
Breitling Cosmonaute 809 - What's not to like?
Definitely happens. I mentioned Goodfellas to a friend on WhatsApp two days ago to describe a situation, not talk about movies, then an article about Goodfellas popped up on my Google news feed an hour later.
I rest my case...................................
Oops! I'm getting ads for case rests!
This tickled me more than it should have. Its all a bit worrying, the only thing that gives me comfort is that currently their motive is just to milk me dry financially
Was the article about the film or the pizza ??
Ha film, something artsy from some dedicated movie website. Not something I'd ever be on.Was the article about the film or the pizza ??
Choose life.
I was with a friend Sunday, discussing the bugasalt gun, which shoots table salt to either kill a fly, or season your bbq meat from a distance.
My social feed is full of adverts & not researched the, on any device. Happy to be heard, but it’s going to make me spend £65 on a toy I don’t need!
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I've not discussed this with anyone and yet my facebook feed is full of adverts for the same gun...I think they've just paid for a lot of facebook marketing. Are you sure you didn't end up discussing it because of the advert rather than the advert appearing because you discussed it?
Certainly not me seeing them as never heard of it before. I am not sure if he did either as believe he saw it on a forum mentioned, but was complaining no U.K. sellers.
Mine was a U.K. seller but at a markup. Could be simply the fact they bought a load of ad space. Think I prefer that as a stream of event to be honest.
All i see now though is that damn gun!
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It strikes me that there are two major differences between our world and the one that Orwell wrote about in 1984.
Firstly, it's not the governments that are listening to your conversations, it's the corporations. Arguably the corporations have more influence.
Secondly, in 1984, party members are forced to accept telescreens, proles aren't monitored & no-one bellyfeels the telescreens.
Oh Alexa, how double-plus-ungood.
There was a Netflix documentary called the Social Dilemma which dealt with broad aspect of this technology. Worth watching if you're curious about how this technology is used.
https://www.netflix.com/gb/title/81254224
Last edited by zippy; 11th June 2021 at 10:37.
Great point, I don't think many would have anticipated how we would have welcomed all of this data gathering & surveillance etc. with open arms. We've productised ourselves
Tested my iPhone once by randomly mentioning the word “Namibia” a few times - not even as part of a coherent sentence, and while the phone was locked with no apps open, and I’ve never even set up Siri. Within hours I was seeing Facebook ads for holidays to Namibia.
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I am another of the "won't have one in the house" brigade - the damn things freak me out. The tracking and data mining is bad enough without the swine hearing my every half-formed muttering and drawing inferences from that as well. I don't have Facebook, Insta or Twitter and would infinitely prefer to avoid WhatsApp too (and would do, save that loads of friends are using it). I don't have a Google account, I don't enable location services on my phone, I don't geotag photos. And yet, I'm sure there are yottabytes of data out there which paint a pretty good picture of my thoughts, fears, hopes and dreams.
I do suspect that folks will look back on this era as a sort of data-privacy Wild West...
I wouldn't willingly have any of that creepy crap in my house although when I first got a Fire tablet a voice came out of it.
I thought it was haunted!
Soon switched it off.
Cheers,
Neil.
I've been telling my Echo Dot, without invoking the "wake" word (ie when it's not supposed to be listening), about my need for a particular consumer item every now and then for two days now. So far I haven't seen any relevant ads pop up anywhere, but I'll keep going.
Happened here last night. I mentioned Queen Latiffa to my daughter and four hours later her music appeared as an ad on IG.
So, I did this. I continued for about a week or so, not every day but most days. I was careful to choose an item that I hadn't recently googled, or seen on a website, or searched anywhere on the World Wide Web. It was a dog collar. I don't have a dog and I don't spend my spare time watching dog videos on YouTube or anything like that. I was very careful never to mention dog collars when it was in "listen" mode, but when it wasn't supposed to be listening I'd occasionally say "I wish I had a dog collar" or "I want a dog collar" or "I really need a dog collar". This is the first time since I had the idea that I've referred to dog collars anywhere online.
I never saw an ad for a dog collar, and I still haven't.
But yesterday the yellow notification light flashed on the Dot on my desk.
"Alexa, what are my notifications?" I enquired.
"Your package including pet collar is due to arrive today", was the reply. Unfortunately I was distracted by something else at work at the same time and never checked my orders. I've just checked them and can find no reference to a pet collar. Certainly, I haven't received one.
Odd, eh?
But almost everyone has a mobile phone, and they listen too (I was in a pub garden with friends when we did the Namibia experiment)
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I've been watching this guy for a while. He knows his stuff and works in the arena. Some may think he's over paranoid but it's eye opening his previous uploads. This one just came up today
https://youtu.be/ccrUAp4GQvY
Tried that while out and about, no Facebook ads unfortunately but a few people did stop to ask if I was ok, needed any help….
Can’t get that song Africa by Toto out of my head either!
I saw an article the other day that essentially said something like the marketing big data picks up which phones you hang around with and shares their marketing suggestions/recent purchases with you. So if they’ve been Googling Uranus and then chat to you about it and you start seeing ads that might be a reason.
I have no idea but that made sense and was marginally less creepy.
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I was forever getting targeted ads via Facebook
Don’t have any listening devices other than iPhone. I’ve deleted Google and installed DuckDuckGo
Hallelujah no more tracking adds , just random non targeted ones.
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Been loving duckduckgo. Still feel like googles just the tip of the iceberg for me though. Maybe its time to go back to the trusty 3310
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