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Amazon's Alexa is the target of a pair of lawsuits that allege the voice assistant violates laws in nine states by illegally storing recordings of children on devices such as the Echo or Echo Dot. It's the latest development in an ongoing debate around Alexa and privacy. The suits were filed in courts in Seattle and Los Angeles on Tuesday, on the eve of Amazon unveiling the latest generation of Echo Dot Kids Edition smart speaker.
Announcing the new version of the devices on Wednesday morning, the company attempted to defuse privacy concerns — saying it built its premium "FreeTime" games and media service for kids with the input of family groups. Amazon said it adheres to the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). The company added, "None of the Alexa skills included within FreeTime Unlimited have access to or collect personal information from children, and there are multiple ways to delete a child's profile or voice recordings."
However, the suits are about the Alexa assistant and Echo devices more broadly, not just the FreeTime service for kids. The suits name nine states — Florida, California, Illinois, Michigan, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Washington — that prohibit recording conversations without the consent of children or their parents.
"At no point does Amazon warn unregistered users that it is creating persistent voice recordings of their Alexa interactions, let alone obtain their consent to do so," the lawsuits allege. The suits were filed in California and Washington state by lawyers from Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP and Keller Lenkner LLC.
Also at BGR, MarketWatch, and Seattle Times.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Friday June 14 2019, @02:29PM (21 children)
to sue Amazon over gross violations of privacy.
Adults are victims of Amazon too, but they're deemed mature enough to be accountable for letting an Amazon device into their homes and putting themselves under surveillance. Yet somehow, I feel adults who are stupid enough to do that may not be much more responsible than children...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 14 2019, @03:23PM (5 children)
Well, you can't cure stupid. And while you could care about stupid,
sure is that stupid with the help of friends smarty and greedy will all accuse you of abusing stupid's *freedom*
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Friday June 14 2019, @09:09PM (3 children)
What about Righty? Aristarchus wants to know.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Friday June 14 2019, @10:19PM (2 children)
aristarchus already knows! Think of the children!
Philosopher John Stuart Mill [wikiquote.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 15 2019, @02:58AM (1 child)
I would agree with that quote, but using the definitions of conservative and stupid that John Stuart Mill would have had.
A conservative used to be someone who preferred the status quo and was resistant to change. This is the sensible position of less intelligent people because their experience is that every time things change it provides another opportunity for some smart wolf to fuck them over.
The current use of 'conservative' is to mean a right-wing authoritarian sociopath asshole. While this doesn't necessarily invalidate the above quote, it does mean that using it to describe current 'conservatives' is at best disingenuous.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday June 15 2019, @11:28AM
Friendly amendment accepted. Chairman, may we proceed to the motion?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 14 2019, @10:53PM
Disservices like Facebook and Amazon have negative externalities which affect people who actually care about privacy. Someone could upload a picture of you to Facebook, and their facial recognition algorithms would get to work even if you don't allow yourself to be used by that disservice. If significant amounts of people use garbage like Alexa, it will be increasingly difficult for privacy-conscious individuals to avoid it. Thus, this is not only a problem for stupid people, but for everyone.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday June 14 2019, @04:22PM (1 child)
While this is true, as I've argued before here, it's distressing that people are suddenly concerned about Amazon and Alexa, but don't realize they've likely been under surveillance for years through other devices. Lots of smartphone apps spy on users through microphones [independent.co.uk] too, and have been for a long time.
What percentage of adults have smartphones? What percentage are smart enough to screen every app they install and restrict permissions? I just looked at my phone, and I have allowed only about 10% of the apps that requested microphone access to actually use it (i.e., the ones that need it, like the basic phone app and a secure video chat app I use). What percentage of idiots have the Facebook app installed on their phone? What percentage of them have disabled microphone access for Facebook? Why aren't we handwringing about children and adults being exploited by THAT?!?
Yes, Alexa answers back. That seems to be the only reason people are worried about the particular instance in TFA -- they notice the possibility for exploitation. But Amazon seems to be rather forthright about what it's doing, whereas thousands of other apps people have on their phones are likely being used for surveillance silently all the time (i.e., "gross violations of privacy"). Where's the outrage and lawsuits there?
In particular, why the hell are apps by default allowed access to so many things on phones? I want there to be at least three warning screens/windows that would go up on my phone before I gave any app access to use my microphone or my camera, and if I want to enable microphone access all the time by default, there should be an additional confirmation screen asking for that. That's what really consumer privacy protection would look like.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday June 14 2019, @04:31PM
Note: I do know that Facebook and others have been criticized in the past over logging personal information collected from phones (though usually texts, call history, etc., not audio or video -- but I assume that's not because they can't do it, only it's harder to do it without setting off giant alarm bells because of huge data transfer). I even know lawsuits have been brought.
I'm just saying that people download and install crap on listening devices they own every day and are giving those things permission to spy on them. Alexa is an obvious target, but I think we're kinda missing the point of how ubiquitous surveillance devices are today, and how much access we're giving them (even explicitly -- I'm not even talking about security holes and ways for OS authors to also be misusing your devices).
(Score: 4, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Friday June 14 2019, @04:55PM (10 children)
I'm not so sure about that. I don't think all those adults are necessarily *stupid*.
I'm sure some are. However, I think *most* folks who bring such a device into their homes (or allow all manner of smartphone apps, TVs, appliances, IoT devices, cars, etc., etc., etc.) to spy on them, for that matter) aren't stupid.
I think they're either *willfully ignorant* (which is much worse than stupid, as you can't fix stupid) or just don't care (which might even be worse than willful ignorance, but making bad decisions is what we humans often do best).
That's not to give Amazon (or Google or Facebook Or Vizio or Samsing or Toshiba or Sony or any of dozens if not hundreds of other companies in dozens of industries) a pass for making surveillance capitalism [wikipedia.org] a core business.
But unless and until that vast majority of folks who are either willfully ignorant or don't care stop enabling them, these folks will continue to profit from this behavior. And as long as they can make a profit, they'll keep doing it. And double-down. Again, again and again.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 14 2019, @05:08PM (2 children)
I don't think all those adults are necessarily *stupid*.
A quick glance at the election results should remove all doubt.
I think they're either *willfully ignorant* (which is much worse than stupid, as you can't fix stupid) or just don't care...
Ok, thanks for clarifying :-)
Propaganda is just as effective on adults as it is on children.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 14 2019, @05:18PM (1 child)
You're talking about the 2018 election, when all the stupids elected a D house?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 14 2019, @11:14PM
Both parties are massively corrupt (to varying degrees and often in different ways, sure), and you have to be stupid to not see that. Neither the Ds or the Rs are the sole problem.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday June 14 2019, @05:17PM (2 children)
Agree, 100%. I want to add, though, that all of it amounts to criminal negligence.
Those children we are worried about today? They are being raised up by those willfully ignorant people. Those willfully ignorant people are TRAINING tomorrow's adults that it is *normal* to submit to 24/7 surveillance by government/corporate/"developer"/garden_variety_nebnose. Today's adults are setting norms, which will carry over into future generations. Babies being born today are unlikely to have any thought, let alone second thoughts, about signing away rights and privileges of privacy. No dystopia springs up overnight - just think on into the future, and imagine when no one remembers what privacy was.
Sally, or Tom, or anyone at all can flip through all the available feeds, until they find a neighbor engaged in some hot passionate sex - then tell their friends about it. When Ricky and Becky get to work the next day, workmates are cheering them for a great performance - and neither one is the least bit embarrassed, because it's normal.
Orwelle got the story skewed a little - we are voluntarily surrendering any right to privacy. Government doesn't have to mandate the tele-screens.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Friday June 14 2019, @05:42PM
Mah nishtanah, ha-laylah ha-zeh? [wikipedia.org]
The difference is only in the impact, not the situation IMHO.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Friday June 14 2019, @08:55PM
I do not agree. There are thousands of dangers, far too many to give each one due diligence. Judging which ones are the most serious is never easy, even apart from whatever hangups and phobias a person may have. This is yet another case of a powerful organization taking advantage of people who must devote most of their attention to greater dangers than a few mosquito bites. Swatting at mosquitoes is not a practical answer. Drain the swamp, that's how such crap is stopped. This lawsuit is a much better approach to such problems than expecting individual users each to perform detailed audits of arcane and devious systems.
Who bothers reading EULAs? Or the long pages of fine print a lot of establishments insist the customers agree to, before allowing them to use the WiFi? There's a lot of legalese in the world that is a load of bull, an attempt to bully and intimidate people into thinking they have fewer rights of less scope than is actually the case. Or it's a snow job, an attempt to hide objectionable stuff by burying it in fine print. Waste of time to read that. "By continuing to use this website, you agree that...." and "You agree not to use the service for any illegal purpose..." No, I don't agree, and if I want to, I'm going to use the website anyway, knowing that whatever crap they've put in there is unimportant. As long as I remain anonymous, there's little they can do. If they demand personal info, fake it, and move on with your life.
(Score: 2) by SomeGuy on Friday June 14 2019, @06:19PM (3 children)
There are different variates of stupid :)
Factor in that there is a LOT of pressure from peers and advertisements to buy these worse than useless gadgets.
I can't even turn on the TV, open a web page, or talk to someone without quickly being reminded that I'm supposed to be using a smartphone for.... uh... something. I love that commercial that starts with "If you own an Amazon Alex..." always finish it with "then you are a fucking moron."
The few "smart" people still out there are more than likely to cave in to such pressure.
But there is plenty of just plain stupid - the vast majority of people on this planet still take their children every Sunday to be molested with lies about an imaginary sky fairy.
There is no escape.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Friday June 14 2019, @06:29PM (2 children)
I take your points. They are good ones.
I posited three groups:
1. The dumb (they can't help that)
2. The willfully ignorant (they can help that and it really chaps my ass)
3. The folks who aren't ignorant, but just don't care (this can be for a variety of reasons)
I suspect that if we were to break down your varieties (variants?) of stupid, we'd end up in a similar place.
As such, I believe that the difference in our points of view are largely ones of nomenclature, not substance.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 14 2019, @10:54PM (1 child)
Every try living the surveillance free lifestyle?
Yea, maybe its stupid to have a smart speaker. What about voice input on your phone? Or modern apps for banking, uber, etc. Everything spies, down to your OS and soon your house and car. Then if you take care of yourself, all of the others around you will have this stuff and you'll get caught up in it. Many people have just given up or aren't knowledgeable enough to tweak all of their devices. Plus, it isn't being shouted from the rooftops, nor have they felt any overt pain from it just yet.
What they do feel is being left out and inconvenienced not using this malware. Having both seen this coming (as anyone remotely paying attention would) and actively fighting back, beating my technology into submission has taken up considerable amounts of time. Even browsing the web on VPN I constantly get blocked from sites and get captchas to where I don't use google anymore.
This is my realm and its a huge PITA while we're mocking people who only delve in at the most superficial level. Most people would turn off the spigot if they could but they lack the knowledge/fortitude and just give up.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Saturday June 15 2019, @02:02AM
You are absolutely correct. It's *really* hard. But not bringing devices into your home that you *know* will be listening to everything you say is just beyond the pale, IMHO.
Just to clarify, I'm not mocking *anyone*. Merely stating what I understand to be true.
Perhaps I *should* add a fourth group to my list as just "ignorant" in addition to "willfully ignorant"
And I don't mean "ignorant" as a pejorative in this context. Rather I mean it in a literal way, as "not knowing."
This is, as you quite rightly point out, a difficult situation. I've had several previous discussions about this here, and the gist of what I've said (and I'm a technology professional with over 15 years of not just IT experience, but, specifically, InfoSec [wikipedia.org] experience) is that I mitigate my digital footprint as best I can without inconveniencing myself too much.
I don't use phone apps for, well, pretty much anything, except for phone calls and text messages -- encrypted (Signal preferred) and SMS (where the other side can't or won't use Signal), and I disable NFC, GPS, Google Location Services and Bluetooth. I'd love to disable my phone provider's ability to track my phone, but I'd like to be able to make and receive phone calls -- It is, after all, a *phone*.
I also disable Wifi when I'm not in a relatively secure location, . I block as much tracking as I can in browsers (with blockers, cookie blocking/management, filtering and "private browsing", disabling javascript, etc.) both on my general purpose computers as well as my mobile device. I certainly don't enable voice access and *definitely* don't have any in-home spying devices like Amazon Echo or Google Home. Nor do I perform *any* financial transactions with my phone.
My take on it is that as much as I do (which is a lot more than most), it's that it's not a very good solution. But it's better than nothing.
And while the corporate spying operations try to fly under the radar (as is extensively discussed in Shoshanna Zuboff's [wikipedia.org] fine book The Age of Surveillance Capitalism [publicaffairsbooks.com]), they're still pretty high profile, IMHO.
In this case, I'm specifically talking about devices that record your voice (as that's the topic of the story), and anyone who is *remotely* paying attention should realize that those recordings are being stored, analyzed and used. What's more, since there has been *plenty* of mainstream press coverage about this over the past couple of years, it's not exactly a secret.
All that said, your point is well-taken. But aside from taking significant (as I do) or somewhat more significant (as you do) steps to *mitigate* our digital footprints, and explain to as many folks as we can the exposure that they face (most of my family just pooh-pooh's the issues -- ignoring the risks even though they know about them), what else can we do. It's not like we can function in society without significant difficulty, as you correctly pointed out.
I suppose we could access online resources only from public terminals (internet cafes, libraries, etc.) and use MAC address spoofing/randomization on Wifi networks (as is the default on IOS, Linux, Android and Windows) on our own devices, as well. However OS and browser fingerprinting is pretty ubiquitous these days, so the the utility of modifying MAC addresses is of limited utility.
Explaining the issues to folks is (at least in my experience) is also not so useful, as even when they understand what's going on, they often *choose* to purchase such devices and use all manner of "free" services that snarf up their PII anyway.
And that extends to the corporate world almost as much as the consumer world.
You may think I'm unduly harsh by calling people "willfully ignorant," and perhaps you're right.
There are people who just don't have the information they need (unintentionally ignorant?), and we should try to help get them that information.
There are those who aren't so bright (that's not an insult -- Half of everyone has an IQ below 100, and a significant fraction of those are under 80 -- I know a lot of people who aren't so bright, almost all of whom are kind, decent and good people, many of whom I call 'friend'). And we should help (and I try) those people to protect themselves.
I save my scorn for those who *should* know better, but choose not to learn, and those who *do* know better and ignore what they know.
What else can we do? As I said in the post to which you replied, "unless and until that vast majority of folks who are either willfully ignorant or don't care stop enabling them, these folks will continue to profit from this behavior. And as long as they can make a profit, they'll keep doing it. And double-down. Again, again and again."
To use a technical term, it's way fucked up.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 14 2019, @07:13PM (1 child)
What else are they good for these days? I already have a remote control, and our dog knows how to bring me a beer from the fridge. Other than tattling on each other (and that the landscaper occasionally takes a leak in the back corner of our yard), what else are children good for? I say put 'em to use and get me another year of Prime for free.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 14 2019, @07:28PM
You can rent them to Democratic candidates for photo ops, or for pizza-related activities.