The smart speakers they have become the hub of many connected homes. There are users who have delegated their entire lives to assistants like Alexa, while others continue to view this technology with fear. One of the great mysteries surrounding Amazon's voice assistant is whether or not it listens to us all the time. And that is the question that we will solve in the next lines.
Does it record you or does it not record you?
There are two types of users: those who would put an Amazon Echo even in the bathroom and those who think that it is nothing more than a version cuckoo of the HAL 9000. Buying a first Echo or a HomePod can even create a family conflict, since not all the people in the house may agree to introduce such an element into the domestic unit. As a curiosity, older people seem to have fewer taboos towards these technologies than younger ones.
One of the reasons why virtual voice assistants have earned some rejection from an audience is the difficulty in knowing how they treat our data. Although manufacturers have already explained actively and passively how their devices work, there is still a lot of mistrust. And this is where we ask ourselves the question. whatAlexa records our conversations without our permission? Is she an ally or is it something like putting a KGB agent in our living room?
Alexa can't record you without your permission
According to Amazon engineers, your device Alexa is only allowed to record once she hears her wake word, which can be Echo, Alexa or Amazon. Once the device detects the word, its blue light will come on, and that is when it will start recording.
And now you will wonder how Alexa can listen to you if she is not recording. Well, in reality, every microphone is registering vibrations even when it is not connected. Alexa—and all the assistants—are able to recognize that wake word. Only after activation, the device has permission to record your voice and send it to Amazon's servers, since the requests we make to Alexa are not processed locally.
How can I see what Alexa has recorded?
Saving the audios of every user who talks to Alexa would be unproductive. For this reason, Alexa converts everything you ask her to plain text. If you want to see the record de data that Alexa has been collectingYou can do it in a very easy way. Open the Alexa app on your mobile phone, go to 'More' and then to 'Activity'. In the second tab you will have the 'Voice History', which is a record of all your conversations with Alexa, only transcribed.
Within this record, you can delete all entries if you wish. If you take a look at this history, you can clearly see that Alexa also detects when it has been activated in the wrong way. In this case, the audio clip will be available.
Therefore, no, Alexa does not record you throughout the day. She can only do it after hearing her activation word. In the event that you want to remove any records from Amazon's servers, you can do so quite easily.
very helpful thank you