Amazon Alexa Has Been Recording Your Conversations Around The House

Photo by Status Quack on Unsplash

Just how much is Alexa listening to your conversations? Answer: More than you think.

Amazon's Alexa is listening for you to say the wake word ("Alexa") and recording your conversations. She then saves them (by default) until you go in and remove them from your account.

MailOnline recently did an investigation and found that even non-wake words are sometimes recorded and stored. That means your good times, bad times, private conversations, arguments, dog barks, baby cries... could sometimes get recorded, stored, and be potentially used to display relevant ads when you're using their site, services, or products, despite Amazon claiming that the devices are listening for the wake word only. Either these are recorded on accident, or the process is flawed. I mean, how can a dog bark out the word, "Alexa"?

One user, Joe Pinkstone found out that his Echo Dot, which was placed on his coffee table, found out that the device has been recording more than it should. Through the archives, he heard a friend of his gossiping about others in a very private conversation that was recorded in perfect clarity. Even moments of silence (when no one was home) was sometimes recorded.

Another person, Stephen Matthews, had a party at this house and was surprised to learn that Alexa recorded him talking about a friend's love life... and all the gossip that went with it.

Annie Palmer found that Alexa recorded one of her phone conversations. She believes that the words, "do you" or "how do you" could also trigger a recording by Alexa.

Here's how to find out what Alexa has been recording on your account

  1. Open the Alexa app which the devices are synced to or click here.
  2. Select the icon in the top left corner - often dubbed the 'hamburger'
  3. Press 'Settings' at the bottom of the menu
  4. Select 'Alexa Account' located at the top of the menu
  5. Press 'Alexa Privacy' at the bottom of the menu
  6. Select 'Review Voice History'
  7. You can also view ALL entries using the 'All History' option in the drop down.
  8. The recordings are sorted in descending order.
  9. If you would like to delete them all, simply press the 'Delete All recordings for All History' button.

Currently, there's no way to download ALL of your recordings.

Photo: Unsplash


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