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Police Seek Amazon Echo Data in Murder Case

posted by on Thursday December 29 2016, @01:37PM   Printer-friendly
from the it's-always-there-always-listening dept.

Several SoylentNews readers have submitted this story:

Amazon Echo is a voice-activated and cloud-connected speaker device that actively listens to a room using several microphones and communicates with Amazon servers to perform various queries and tasks.

Warrant Filed for Amazon Echo Records in Arkansas Murder Case

Booga1 writes:

Arkansas police filed what is believed to be the first request to retrieve information from an Amazon Echo device in a homicide investigation.

[...] Authorities charged Bates, 31, with murder earlier this year, but police in the Ozark city are now looking to find evidence on his Echo, according to The Information [paywalled].

[...] Amazon twice refused to hand over information requested by police, according to The Information, but gave them Bates' account information and purchase history.

The company said in a statement on Tuesday that it "will not release customer information without a valid and binding legal demand properly served on us."

[Continues...]

US Police Request Amazon Echo Data in Murder Case - Amazon Says No

Webweasel writes:

US police have issued Amazon with two search warrants which they have refused. More info is available from the BBC.

Difficult one this. I wouldn't have a device like the Echo in my home. But I can understand why people would want the device. Should have Amazon given up the data on request?

Editor's note: Also at Engadget, USA Today, and The Verge.

Original Submission #1  Original Submission #2  Original Submission #3  Original Submission #4 

 
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 30 2016, @01:57PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 30 2016, @01:57PM (#447412)

    What isn't clear is exactly how the devices work. It would be incredibly wasteful of resources and basically stupid if these devices recorded and stored everything they hear. They listen for their phrases to wake up "Alexa", "Ok Google", etc., so you essentially need to run a DSP matched filter on the data without doing any voice recognition. Once you get the wakeup command, then you record what you hear and push it through the voice recognition algorithms.