Seems like Amazon is almost desperate to put Alexa in every device and home, and other devices that have voice activation are EVERYWHERE. My wife and I are fine without this insane little nicety, after all, I don't want Amazon spying on me that far, or to have to watch what I say around the TV. These devices are listening to you and sending your data back home. It's to the point I have to be paranoid about letting my Playstation 4 online (the controllers have microphones) and ensuring the TV is blocked in my firewall, even if it isn't technically connected to the net (eventually they will come with their own data band connections if they don't already and the only option is to unplug it when not in use).

Why is it getting harder and harder to avoid these spying technologies disguised as convenience, and how long before we are not able to get basic equipment (many REFRIGERATORS now have data uplinks.... because...?) without having to literally coat our homes in tin foil (or some signal blocking foam) to keep from being spied on everywhere? I already don't do much in the same room as my phone when I'm not using it.

What are your thoughts? Useless paranoia or legitimate concern?

Easy solution: Stop talking with people. Write 'em a WhatsApp instead!

:P :P :P

Nah, seriously... I'm not a huge fan of devices that are listening to you. A few months ago I was talking with someone who had his iPhone lying on the table. He didn't touch it and didn't say anything that sounded like "Siri". But when he said the word "brighter" (it was in the middle of a sentence), Siri interrupted our conversation to inform us that she turned the display a bit brighter. That was... creepy oO

Not a fan of this kind of tech - especially as you cant always avoid it due to other peoples phones etc.
However, Scots are somewhat immune to it.

Edit: the link does have proper subtitles

I'm not sure what the endgame is with all the voice-activated stuff. Maybe it is like touchscreens and the elimination of actual progress bars, designed for children and particularly unsavvy adults. It's certainly not made for power users. For similar reasons I think smart cars are an abomination. I would like to think that the "only" listening being done is related to advertising purposes (note that if you are browsing on Amazon, you have to click to turn browsing history off...and will need to do so again if you've cleared cookies). That said, read this and get some chills: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vault_7

''Just what do you think you are doing, Dave?''

Legitimate concern, even if the companies arn't spying on you, it doesn't mean someone else won't.

The more things you have connected to an open network, the less privacy you have.

Looks like we`re getting Butlers Jihad rather sooner than later.

https://xkcd.com/1807/ comes to mind.

As for me, I'm backward. No voice recognition phone or speaker and, I've managed to disable Cortana on Windows.

I was previously employed at a company that developed for the Android platform. Every so often we would be having an internal discussion and a random phone would go "I'm sorry, could you please repeat that".

We actually took voice recognition/dictation capabilities out of the product. We supplied both phone and software, and the former was locked down for use in hospital environments. One of our clients got very angry that our medical devices could be used to search for poor impoversihed women who couldn't afford clothes. It turned out that web search and voice functionality were linked, so dictation had to go.

My home will become "smart" over my dead body. This is basically my attitude.

If newly produced household equipment starts coming pre-installed microphones (or cameras) or is equipped to the Internet in some way I'll start buying used household equipment on the second-hand market instead.

My Sony TV has had wifi for a while, but i've never used it, i use a Chromecast, but since i don't watch porn through it and i have movies on the playstore, that doesn't bother me, i do dislike how it has to be connected to the internet for the images though, that never used to be a requirement originally.

I put electrical tape over the cameras and mics on any device I own. Been doing that for years. Don't even plug a mic into my computer unless I am going to use it then and there. You have to be a special kind of dumb to wire your house with mics linked to the internet.

We have one in the bedroom and one in the living room, but their entire purpose is to play music on. I stream MP3s from my phone and my wife uses the streaming services. I think the downstairs one can turn a lamp on an off, but that's it for connected "devices" lol.

It's the age of convenience, some of the ideas are tempting, especially the wifi for lights and plug sockets, as i have to few plug sockets, and i like turning things off before i go out, but i passed on the idea, i'll just get my lazy ass out of bed and do it manually.

Nothing voice activated yet though it may be coming. Just ordered smart devices for my heating since i have 6 separate heaters and no central temperature control. Turning them all on/off every day gets very tiring (not all easily accessible either), not to mention you forget one every now and then, and since they installed temperature knobs on them that means they start going full blast all night if you leave one on to keep the temperature they are set to keep.

Well this is the present future: