Security

Amazon has confirmed a report that one of its Echo devices recorded a family’s conversation and then messaged it to a random person on the family’s contact list, who is an employee of a family member.

But Amazon, in a statement emailed to Computerworld, confirmed every privacy advocate’s worst nightmare with its explanation: “Echo woke up due to a word in background conversation sounding like ‘Alexa.’ Then, the subsequent conversation was heard as a ‘send message’ request. At which point, Alexa said out loud ‘To whom?’ At which point, the background conversation was interpreted as a name in the customer’s contact list. Alexa then asked out loud, ‘[contact name], right?’ Alexa then interpreted background conversation as ‘right.’ As unlikely as this string of events is, we are evaluating options to make this case even less likely.”

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