This has been the underlying American business model For many Decades, Actuaries & Accountants will run Worst-case/Best-case, and it has all too often = "let's do it!" ...
While that may seem silly, there was a lawsuit where I only vaguely remember details. A college sports coach accidentally dialed his phone and the person on the other end heard a conversation that was with his wife. The person hearing the call took advantage of the information. The couple sued for some sort of invasion of privacy. He lost because he accidentally did make the call. She won.
I was making a point about this with a co worker about 10 years ago. I started randomly talking about camping-something I rarely if ever have talked about- and the ads on Facebook all the sudden turned to camping accessories. Can't write that off to coincidence.
A friend of my wife was visiting from Spain. While she was visiting they had to go to the supermarket to get some apple cider vinegar, which apparently isn't a thing in Spain. Within an hour she was getting ads for apple cider vinegar, in English, on all her social media and search engines.
@nolongeramused8135 It's almost unavoidable now. I unplug the Alexa when we're not using it, I got rid of our newer cars and we daily drive classic cars (mine is actually 59 years old) but it's not reasonable to turn your fone off. It's just a little disturbing and I proved it was happening 10 years ago. How much worse is it now?
2 years ago I'm on my parents computer, which is synced to my moms phone, and my mom is on speakerphone talking to someone else. We start talking about a house we had seen that day being built with an outdoor elevator...........I start getting ads for 2-3 story elevators!! I can guarantee I've never looked up house elevators in my life, chairlifts I'd understand but this was too on the nose.
I was at an AirBNB in Phoenix in 2023, watching a live stream on TH-cam. During the stream one of the hosts said, loudly, "hey Alexa" and the Alexa device in the AirBNB lit up and said "hi, how can I help you?" I had no idea there was an Alexa in the house and that voice scared the hell out of me!
Witnessed similar with a Google assistant device. It was it another room, situated furthest away from the dining room I was in having a meal. It was playing loud music, which makes it near impossible to give instructions to, (like change music, or turn off or turn down volume, etc). I was speaking very lowly to my girlfriend seated directly in front of me, when the assistant suddenly lowered the sound to nothing and then spoke in a very strange voice, making a rude dismissal reply to what I said to my girlfriend. She was also stunned. Proves it is always listening
I am a contractor and for years now every time I go to a certain clients house my YT feed will have videos related to our conversation. These conversations were often about extremely niche topics, no way it is coincidence, been going on for years. I would estimate at least 100 times. I do not carry a cell phone, they use apple products.
Check if Google is turned on in your phone. I was having things on my TH-cam coming up that had only been mentioned once. The most convincing to confirm the phone was listening was a specific and very unusual small building work idea my girlfriend mentioned just once to me. I was in a hurry, so just agreed it was a good idea and left her house to later that day discover on my TH-cam a video coming up showing builders in England doing exact same task. So her just saying a couple of sentences describing an unusual work idea was absorbed by my phone. Discovered it was Google on my iPhone. (Siri was turned off)
3:00 my brother tried telling me I was wrong about that too, he said they could get in trouble for, as if that's ever stopped anyone from breaking the law to make money.
I'd assume that to change the wake-up name, you'd just ask Alexa how to change it. 😃 "Hey, Alexa, I'd like to change your name" "What name would you like to give me?" "I'd like your name to be boofhead." "My name is now boofhead." 🤣
I have used Android phones (Samsung Galaxy) for years. I first discovered what you talked about a while ago - I was having a conversation with a friend about going to Japan, and I was inundated with ads for flights to Japan (didn't even do a search on the phone; it was just on the table listening). This has happened many times.
I mentioned wanting to learn play the piano in a conversation with my wife and her friend in a coffee shop - guess what was pushed to me on Amazon the next time I logged in?
I was at a friend's house, chatting in the kitchen. She showed me a kitchen gadget I hadn't seen before. She never named the thing, AND my phone was in my purse in another room. Guess what product's ads soon flooded my Facebook feed? Maybe there's something to the paranoia joke.... "Of course you aren't being monitored," said the coffee maker.
Around 2014 I was talking to a coworker about her newborn -- within minutes and for several days after I started seeing ads on facebook for diapers and cribs. Facebook was on record around that time that they were not listening in and that their predictive algorithm was just that good... so good that it was showing a single guy diaper ads out of the blue... Until there is a genuinely significant penalty for this sort of behavior, nothing's going to change.
It was controversial back in the day when Siri and Google Assistant added voice activation for this exact reason. Everyone chose to forget about that though because people love convenience...
when are they going to go after Facebook for this? i swear i mention something to standing next to me with my phone in my pocket, the next day im getting ads through Facebook
Facebook has its own set of intrusions. Such as tracking your location in the app even when you have location services turned off for the app on your phone. After my husband (who works in IT) read an article about it, I removed ALL Meta apps from my phone (Facebook app, FB Messenger, Instagram).
That’s because Apple is selling the information to Facebook. Facebook will just say they bought information legally. They didn’t know Apple was getting it “accidentally.”
I tested this once intentionally. I talked about dog toys around my android a few years ago. I didn't text or search anything. I then went to a Wikipedia page and other web pages and there were all sorts of ads for dog toys. Absolutely crazy. I'm still very mad at that to this day. Who knows what ideas or information they stole from me. We have no freedom
If it has a microphone, it is listening. If it has a camera, it is watching. Why would anyone believe that they dont use the information they can easily collect? If it can react to an activation word, obviously, it is always listening. Remember when the RIAA paid out a class action suit for price gouging, and they stopped doing it immediately afterward? Yea, they did not. That was just their way of informing the public that they did it and will continue.
Let me guess. It amounts to about $20 per victim that was spied on. Meanwhile, companies like Google make $13 to $14 a month (per user) according to the statistic I read three or four years ago, and it's probably more now.
@@stephanreiken9912 Nope, each victim will end up with $2 or less. Lawyers will end up being paid out of the settlement, leaving very little after their fees.
I did some piecework for a digital company where they gave us conversations to transcribe and compare to the AI transcripts of the same conversation. These were mostly short conversations rather than search or information requests. I quit because they threatened to sue anyone who published about our transcription work which changed it from slightly to very creepy.
That happened to me, too. When i yelled at my kid, my tablet answered it couldn"t help me with that! I shut off everything. Now i am fighting with my truck about who's driving! I keep trying to shut off all of the tracking and voice, but it keeps coming back on. It has caused so many near misses, i am afraid to drive it!
That itself should be a lawsuit. Didnt a bunch of car companies have ads scaring peoplee about how forcing them to allow third parties to fix vehicles would be "unsecure" they should get sued on that basis as well. They ADVERTISED how horrible their security is
Computers have long since gotten fast enough that voice recognition can be handled locally. My car (using the built-in navigation) does it just fine. The companies just insist on transmitting your voice clip back to their servers for voice recognition, so they can collect more data about you to sell.
I wanna say there is no way you can do that with Siri as when you go to set up your phone and set up Siri there’s two questions I ask you yes or no to share your recordings with Apple however, I’ve never tested it and I am an IT professional to say no and see what happens. I will be tested out of my next new phone
A family member was telling me about how she had to use a translator app for a patient that spoke a language from burma and later that night i was getting ads from my state health department in that language
Why every time these kinds of lawsuit get settled, i ve heard similar story time and time again, every time is the same, "settled" "settled". Not a single one gets anything. Because they don't want to get buried in legal fees? Why not ask for legal fee in the complaint? I know normally you have to pay your own legal fee, but I remember Steve said you can ask for legal fee as damage in some cases, not sure if this qualifies, is it really that hard just because the legals fees?
I’ve never used Siri ever. It does what I can just do for myself. Unless there’s some features I’m missing out on. But setting reminders, timers, grocery lists, or whatever else I can do on my own. That’s stuff I should look to see it’s done right anyway. So why not just do it.
There’s that old quote “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.” Cases like this have and will continue to prove that it’s no longer even about safety, we’re being tracked in everything we do in return for a few mere seconds of convenience.
You are not paranoid ENOUGH. Consider: recent phones make it virtually impossible for the user to remove the battery. They claim that this is to improve moisture resistance, but the actual reason is that your phone can be doing things even if you have shut it down. The mic and camera can be activated without giving any indication, and the data can be transmitted without a user even being aware that their phone is active while they think it is turned off. Formerly, you could ensure your complete privacy by removing the battery, but now the only way is to completely wrap the device in metal, thus making a Faraday cage, and preventing any electromagnetic signals from getting to or from your device ... but be aware that you can HEAR through aluminium foil, and the recordings can be transmitted the next time your device connects to any network.
Several years ago I bought a brand new 55" Samsung smart tv with all the bells & whistles. A co-worker asked me if I knew that it listened and possibly recorded my speech in my own home. I didn't believe it possible but after looking into it I found out he was right. It's all in the micro print legalese of the TOS or whatever. Now I just assume even the toaster is listening.
Two nights ago I was watching TV and suddenly my Android phone said "ok, your alarm is set for 9:30". I said not a word. But some character on the TV was saying something about "in a few hours" or something like that. And it triggered the 'droid.
Now do Facebook, Amazon and Google. Can't tell you how many times I've talked to someone about something or other, and then start getting ads for it. I only notice it when it is something unusual, a specific old movie, a musical instrument that I don't own or ever search for, etc. Or my son tells me about a video he thinks I should check out, and next time I open TH-cam it shows up in the recommended videos.
I so agree with Steve. Years ago I expressed concern over ads and pop-ups saying, example, it is 26 mins to a bar I drink at. I would say, this is scary. What is going on? Everyone said "you are already drunk" Well, time has passed and I guess I was not crazy. Steve, you should talk about cars and the cameras and microphones the have INSIDE the car.
My mom would be talking in her house, and goigle would pop up and say, i can help you with that, and she would turn around and say, i wasnt talking to you!!! *sigh* another time i was talking with a friend over coffee, and the phone , on the table,like a third person in the room, popped up with "want to scold anyone else?!?!?!" in response
Absolutely, my wife and I noticed that too, so we tried stuff we would never need or want and bam it showed up. What a shame this happened. The payout and settlement is nothing but a coward's way out. They next time need to be very costly.
I'm commenting before watching, but I do want to say that (afaik) this lawsuit was over contractors who listened to the audio of accidental captures, not a systematic ad network.
Facebook did this too, but they *said* that they quit listening. Scout GPS still does it AFAIK, so if you are pairing your phone to your car's infotainment system, you may have it listening as well. I figure that Google and Amazon probably bleed off their received audio to advertisers or their respective AI's too.
I had my android phone and Google maps navigation change a specific and specialized destination in mid-navigation and subsequently take me to another of the same type of location based entirely on either eavesdropping on my conversation or texts. The incident made me a believer.
The Google AI assistant and Siri assistant can be shut off in the settings. That's what I did as I was talking to someone about the weather which I think it was during summer and I said scorcher and Siri activated. Same with Google - say anything that sounds like Hey Google or Google and it listens. I'd rather press and hold the home button to activate rather than have them listening.
Now for a class action suit against google. On many occasions I have mentioned something on my flip phone and within 24 hours I get an add for it on utube.
About a year ago me and my wife were talking about how I need new windows for my house next thing. You know, we're getting all kinds of ADS for companies that install windows. Imagine that.
@christopherg2347 yes sir and their time and cost is worth 10s of Millions lol gotcha Aren't 99% of "representatives" lawyers too? Boy, where would the world be without em
@@dtcdtc8328 Nobody would take up class action lawsuits and the companies never loose anything for their misdeeds. No idea why you think that world would be better.
The word smart is an acronym S.M.A.R.T. which stands for: Self Monitoring And REPORTING Technology. You have to ask yourself "Just who is it reporting all your data to?" I actually installed a physical micro-switch on my phone that directly disables the microphone. Haven't had any incidents of eavesdropping...aka coincidental advertisements...from it since. Ben is up at bat today :)
By definition, any voice activated product would need to constantly listen to be able to respond. Once my wife decided to get a smart home assistant, we gave up on the notion of privacy in our home. :)
@@timduncan6750 Yes it's supposed to know my voice. I did train it to do so, but others say SIRI and occasionally she asks WHAT??? Steve's voice works!
I'm a software engineer and I can tell you that there is no way this is accidental and it's not limited to iOS. Apple was just the first to get too relaxed with data mining and people could finally prove they weren't paranoid and that the eavesdropping was real. Breaking it down at the most basic level, you trigger Siri with a key phrase right? How can it pair the sound of the phrase if it's not listening, it can't. That doesn't mean it's bad but it does mean there is room for malicious exploitation, designed exploitation, or just human error with the engineering. It's not unreasonable to think that it's probable that one of those things could happen. The intent is easily proven though by monitoring. Apple would be monitoring the quantity of Siri triggers, questions asked, and answered to make sure it's working as expected and that they improve. You would expect X amount of triggers and the duration of the part where it listens for a question. They honestly say accidentally when hours of listening are happening daily per device when normally it should be 20 seconds here, 30 there, etc.
Had a conversation with my wife about diapers. We have never once discussed this nor searched for it online. The next day, I am getting ads for Diapers. Android devices.
Last year or so I was doing some renovations and mentioned to my husband I wasn’t sure if I should go with Lowe’s or Home Depot. Got an email within the hour showing ads from BOTH of these competitors in a single email. No coincidence.
Same and Steve never said the wake command just Siri instead of Hey Siri. Though this ones an actual accidental activation. What they need to explain is the ones where it activates and deactivates silently hoping you don’t notice. Despite the only mode allowing silent activation being off.
🦋 My dad and my uncle were having a conversation and my dad said ' I should give Mara a call' next thing he knew he heard my voice from the other room😂 turns out his cell called me 😅 🦋
I got ads related to stuff I had discussed but never searched on my Android but that's been about a year ago and earlier. I guess they saw the writing on the wall from the Apple lawsuit and preemptively stopped this practice.
It isn't just Siri, and I wouldn't be surprised if they all do it. Some years ago, 2019 or so, I was in the car with my mother and made a comment about how a certain author had written cameos of a certain kind of s*x toy in multiple of their stories, which I'd found a little strange. It wasn't something I'd ever mentioned before or would have ever searched for, written or texted anyone about. Later that day, at home on my computer, what kind of ads do you think my browser started showing? I was mortified. And I didn't even have Siri, that was an Android phone.
Got my Verizon wireless settlement money today. Was supposed to be 15 dollars plus a dollar for every month Verizon charged fake fees up to 100 dollars payment max, but got a whopping 14 dollars. Was expecting 100. Class action lawsuits are attorney scams. 😂
So let me get this right - lawyers make tens of thousands people in suit make 20 bucks each apple / slap on wrist Yea, sounds like typical court in America ! THAT'S AMERICAN JUSTICE and you get screwed again.
It literally just happened yesterday where my dad replied to my mom sarcastically "Thank you" and without missing a beat Siri responded "You're welcome"
That is why I have switched phone carriers, and bought a Fairphone. The phone isn't the best phone I have ever owned, but it doesn't spy on me. Your data is also only as secure as the apps that you give access to your phone.
Years ago a radio station host here in Australia did the experiment. The plan was to mention “cuckoo clocks” in conversation to see if adverts for cuckoo clocks started appearing on their phone. It took less than a day.
On an old flip phone, over a decade ago, I took a pic of a dog cage at the store I was in and sent it in a text...then I got bombarded with ads for dog crates! By now we should all know this is a thing.
My family use to play a game where we randomly grab the name of a product that nobody in the family used or had interest in. We never said the word out loud, we wrote it down on a piece of paper. Once everyone agreed on the word, while sitting at the dinner table with our phones turned off next to our plate, we all started to use sentences containing the word for 5 minutes. Most of the fun was thinking of crazy ways to use the word in a sentence. The game was, whoever’s phone gave them the ad first after talking about it for five minutes would win. Surprisingly, the people who won the most were the ones that spent the least amount of time on their phone, especially doing social media. I am not sure how that plays into the algorithm. By the way, I’ve told other people about this game before, and they went and played it at home and got the same results.
The TOASTER!?!? And here I was thinking I just had to be careful what I say around the TV! Damn TV is waaay too sensitive! Seriously though - a couple months ago I started getting ads in Spanish. I do not speak Spanish. Very annoying! I have a couple friends who are multilingual. I had been out shopping with one and wondered if it was possible she had used my phone to Google something. Service is all kinds of spotty and weird where I live. One phone will work where another won't - it seemed like a reasonable explanation. But no, she hadn't searched anything, nothing. I just realized we got manicures, the tech did not speak English well. My friend spoke Spanish with her the entire time we were there. I was playing games on my phone until it was my turn. I have all voice activated garbage on my phone turned off - it keeps popping up wanting me to talk text. I guess I know why I have Spanish ads now. Fortunately I usually throw the phone in the backpack where it immediately deep dives to the bottom. Hence no ads in Albanian, Czech, German, etc.
My Samsung out of no where would suddenly say” I’m sorry I didn’t hear you”! My iPhone while just sitting Siri will come on and just spin like I asked it a question. We don’t have to worry about big brother we’ve went and bought the products and volunteered our own info up 24 hrs a day.
Exactly. Obama and the NSA- if you didn’t know that then that’s a shame. All of them do it. They collect and sell your data without consent. If any person did this- they’d be prosecuted for conducting research without consent.
I asked Siri what she thought about the eavesdropping case and Siri stopped working. She wouldn’t respond to me. But a few minutes later, she finally responded to Steve saying “Siri.”
Oh boy ! I'm going to get a 35 cent coupon ! 3:30 - If my toaster was listening to me, it wouldn't burn my toast. Then again, I might have a spiteful toaster !
Steve, no joke, I was watching this video on full volume while cooking dinner and at about 2:35 Siri on my Apple IPhone started talking about setting or something.
Android does the same thing and it started 6 to 10 years ago I'm not sure if it's Google on Android or what but just very obscure things like a laser cutter mentioned at a lunch meeting and then I get an advertisement for a laser cutter
Good question! Since it's per device, probably doesn't matter. I have had TH-cam recommendations based on obscure things other people said near my phone.
Had this happen numerous times with my iPhones. Sitting poolside with some friends on a lazy Sunday afternoon. Some of the guys were smoking cigars. I declined on since I quit them many years earlier. When I got home, there were cigar ads on my PC. Another time it happened with car tires on my office PC. Sick stuff.
They made billions and they were fined millions! That will teach them!!!
And just imagine how much the lawyers are going to get versus the people
Lawyers 90 million
People 5 million
They settled for that amount. 1.5 Billion if they lost in court. No admission to guilt as well.
Calicon thank you !!! I would gladly take a $100,000 fine if I made over $10,000,000 breaking the law.
This has been the underlying American business model For many Decades, Actuaries & Accountants will run Worst-case/Best-case, and it has all too often = "let's do it!" ...
It's called business tax.
They settle for 0.1% of the money they made, lawyers get 90% of it, you get rejected for the 2$ they offer you as recompense
or they send an oversized check, that won't work with an ATM. Forcing you to lineup in the bank and use a teller. For your dollar.
Were they your lawyers or working together with their lawyers to split the fees?
they didn't go to trial it was settled, the lawyers will take a chunk but it isn't going to be the same as if they went to trial
Cost of doing business. Everyone knows. I don't get why Americans aren't pissed off.
The system is a joke!
What about non Apple owners who had been eavesdropped on because they were near someone with an Apple Siri product?
While that may seem silly, there was a lawsuit where I only vaguely remember details. A college sports coach accidentally dialed his phone and the person on the other end heard a conversation that was with his wife. The person hearing the call took advantage of the information. The couple sued for some sort of invasion of privacy. He lost because he accidentally did make the call. She won.
Second hand eavesdropping. Seriously though.
Just think of the havoc that you COULD have caused had you been aware of it!
or called someone who had an iphone
It’s ok, they are android users and Google is open about eavesdropping and selling your data. It’s literally thier business model.
1950's: Don't say that! There could be a wire tap in the room!
2020's: Hey wire tap! How do I grill perfect salmon?
Just because you're paranoid, it doesn't mean they're not out to get you.
Remember the Apple commercial that they made back during the 1984 Super Bowl parodying the Big Brother scene from "1984." The irony.
They changed sides since then
welcome to the greed factor. "executive suite" movie
Yes, and I also remember when Google's motto used to be "Don't be Evil."
Commercial wasn't meant to be fictional; They were telling you exactly what the new world order had planned; And, continues pushing toward...
Remember that Apple exemplifies - and actively employs - this age-old tactic: Always accuse your competition of what you are already doing.
I was making a point about this with a co worker about 10 years ago. I started randomly talking about camping-something I rarely if ever have talked about- and the ads on Facebook all the sudden turned to camping accessories. Can't write that off to coincidence.
A friend of my wife was visiting from Spain. While she was visiting they had to go to the supermarket to get some apple cider vinegar, which apparently isn't a thing in Spain. Within an hour she was getting ads for apple cider vinegar, in English, on all her social media and search engines.
@nolongeramused8135 It's almost unavoidable now. I unplug the Alexa when we're not using it, I got rid of our newer cars and we daily drive classic cars (mine is actually 59 years old) but it's not reasonable to turn your fone off. It's just a little disturbing and I proved it was happening 10 years ago. How much worse is it now?
2 years ago I'm on my parents computer, which is synced to my moms phone, and my mom is on speakerphone talking to someone else. We start talking about a house we had seen that day being built with an outdoor elevator...........I start getting ads for 2-3 story elevators!!
I can guarantee I've never looked up house elevators in my life, chairlifts I'd understand but this was too on the nose.
I was at an AirBNB in Phoenix in 2023, watching a live stream on TH-cam. During the stream one of the hosts said, loudly, "hey Alexa" and the Alexa device in the AirBNB lit up and said "hi, how can I help you?" I had no idea there was an Alexa in the house and that voice scared the hell out of me!
So now they are talking to each other.
And your hosts were recording everything lol
You should be a lot more worried about all the hidden cameras in Air BnBs than an alexa...
@coldlogic800 not after I unplugged it!
Witnessed similar with a Google assistant device.
It was it another room, situated furthest away from the dining room I was in having a meal. It was playing loud music, which makes it near impossible to give instructions to, (like change music, or turn off or turn down volume, etc).
I was speaking very lowly to my girlfriend seated directly in front of me, when the assistant suddenly lowered the sound to nothing and then spoke in a very strange voice, making a rude dismissal reply to what I said to my girlfriend. She was also stunned.
Proves it is always listening
"Right now, your toaster is listening to you…" No, because my toaster is from 1965. It has coils, that's it. Best toast ever.
And what do you suppose audio transmission antennas are made of??? Yep, coils of wire! Steve IS right, again! 😂😂😂
@@merlesgarage It's like the power grid is one big radio.
Are you sure?
I am a contractor and for years now every time I go to a certain clients house my YT feed will have videos related to our conversation. These conversations were often about extremely niche topics, no way it is coincidence, been going on for years. I would estimate at least 100 times. I do not carry a cell phone, they use apple products.
Check if Google is turned on in your phone. I was having things on my TH-cam coming up that had only been mentioned once. The most convincing to confirm the phone was listening was a specific and very unusual small building work idea my girlfriend mentioned just once to me. I was in a hurry, so just agreed it was a good idea and left her house to later that day discover on my TH-cam a video coming up showing builders in England doing exact same task.
So her just saying a couple of sentences describing an unusual work idea was absorbed by my phone. Discovered it was Google on my iPhone. (Siri was turned off)
One time my girlfriend told me I don't listen to her - well, then I told her talk to Siri, she listens to everyone.
"The toaster is listening to me..."
That's nice. I haven't had anyone to talk to. LOL
😂😂
3:00 my brother tried telling me I was wrong about that too, he said they could get in trouble for, as if that's ever stopped anyone from breaking the law to make money.
Church secretary has an Alexa in her office. Someone named their kid Alexa. I work in the church nursery. We can't mention the toddler in her office.
You can change the wake word to "computer", but don't ask me how.
Nick name the child Siri
I’ve taught a kid named Alexa. I don’t know what the family was thinking.
@ferretyluv The Alexa I care for is 2. I also question their decision too.
I'd assume that to change the wake-up name, you'd just ask Alexa how to change it. 😃
"Hey, Alexa, I'd like to change your name"
"What name would you like to give me?"
"I'd like your name to be boofhead."
"My name is now boofhead."
🤣
I have used Android phones (Samsung Galaxy) for years. I first discovered what you talked about a while ago - I was having a conversation with a friend about going to Japan, and I was inundated with ads for flights to Japan (didn't even do a search on the phone; it was just on the table listening). This has happened many times.
I mentioned wanting to learn play the piano in a conversation with my wife and her friend in a coffee shop - guess what was pushed to me on Amazon the next time I logged in?
I was at a friend's house, chatting in the kitchen. She showed me a kitchen gadget I hadn't seen before. She never named the thing, AND my phone was in my purse in another room. Guess what product's ads soon flooded my Facebook feed? Maybe there's something to the paranoia joke.... "Of course you aren't being monitored," said the coffee maker.
Around 2014 I was talking to a coworker about her newborn -- within minutes and for several days after I started seeing ads on facebook for diapers and cribs. Facebook was on record around that time that they were not listening in and that their predictive algorithm was just that good... so good that it was showing a single guy diaper ads out of the blue...
Until there is a genuinely significant penalty for this sort of behavior, nothing's going to change.
It was controversial back in the day when Siri and Google Assistant added voice activation for this exact reason. Everyone chose to forget about that though because people love convenience...
People love convenience even at the loss of privacy and exposing their intimate details to evil people [advertisers].
People would sell their souls for comfort and convenience.
@@FarckewVerimucc I'd change "would" to "do"
@@mekaerwin7187 right you are.
when are they going to go after Facebook for this? i swear i mention something to standing next to me with my phone in my pocket, the next day im getting ads through Facebook
Right, along with Google, Android
Facebook has its own set of intrusions. Such as tracking your location in the app even when you have location services turned off for the app on your phone. After my husband (who works in IT) read an article about it, I removed ALL Meta apps from my phone (Facebook app, FB Messenger, Instagram).
That’s because Apple is selling the information to Facebook. Facebook will just say they bought information legally. They didn’t know Apple was getting it “accidentally.”
You tube as well
I tested this once intentionally. I talked about dog toys around my android a few years ago. I didn't text or search anything. I then went to a Wikipedia page and other web pages and there were all sorts of ads for dog toys. Absolutely crazy. I'm still very mad at that to this day. Who knows what ideas or information they stole from me. We have no freedom
If it has a microphone, it is listening. If it has a camera, it is watching. Why would anyone believe that they dont use the information they can easily collect? If it can react to an activation word, obviously, it is always listening.
Remember when the RIAA paid out a class action suit for price gouging, and they stopped doing it immediately afterward? Yea, they did not. That was just their way of informing the public that they did it and will continue.
. ALLOW
. ALLOW JUST ONCE
. DO NOT ALLOW
. NEVER ALLOW
Not true to big business. Your statement is exactly why I stopped XM radio.
Nice Haiku...
Let me guess. It amounts to about $20 per victim that was spied on. Meanwhile, companies like Google make $13 to $14 a month (per user) according to the statistic I read three or four years ago, and it's probably more now.
Minor cost of doing business, ofc
Probably not, as stated they will give more, or 'less'' depending on the number of claims. They will claim there is more.
@@stephanreiken9912 Nope, each victim will end up with $2 or less. Lawyers will end up being paid out of the settlement, leaving very little after their fees.
I did some piecework for a digital company where they gave us conversations to transcribe and compare to the AI transcripts of the same conversation. These were mostly short conversations rather than search or information requests. I quit because they threatened to sue anyone who published about our transcription work which changed it from slightly to very creepy.
You just published it.
@@mercoid Really? What is the name of the company?
My toaster is not listening to me. No matter how much I shout and curse at it, it still burns my raisin bread.
That happened to me, too. When i yelled at my kid, my tablet answered it couldn"t help me with that! I shut off everything. Now i am fighting with my truck about who's driving! I keep trying to shut off all of the tracking and voice, but it keeps coming back on. It has caused so many near misses, i am afraid to drive it!
That itself should be a lawsuit. Didnt a bunch of car companies have ads scaring peoplee about how forcing them to allow third parties to fix vehicles would be "unsecure" they should get sued on that basis as well. They ADVERTISED how horrible their security is
@@techdiyer5290I bet there is some IT Guru that has posted a video on YT on how to do this...
There is a reason i own 3 vehicles and none of which are newer than 2002. No tracking, no listening and I'm the only one driving.
Computers have long since gotten fast enough that voice recognition can be handled locally. My car (using the built-in navigation) does it just fine. The companies just insist on transmitting your voice clip back to their servers for voice recognition, so they can collect more data about you to sell.
Wait people didn't know this was happening to them??
I wanna say there is no way you can do that with Siri as when you go to set up your phone and set up Siri there’s two questions I ask you yes or no to share your recordings with Apple however, I’ve never tested it and I am an IT professional to say no and see what happens. I will be tested out of my next new phone
A family member was telling me about how she had to use a translator app for a patient that spoke a language from burma and later that night i was getting ads from my state health department in that language
There ya go.
It's state sponsored.
Big Brother *IS* watching...
And listening
Why every time these kinds of lawsuit get settled, i ve heard similar story time and time again, every time is the same, "settled" "settled". Not a single one gets anything. Because they don't want to get buried in legal fees? Why not ask for legal fee in the complaint? I know normally you have to pay your own legal fee, but I remember Steve said you can ask for legal fee as damage in some cases, not sure if this qualifies, is it really that hard just because the legals fees?
I can attest that I can be listening to blaring music in my car and casually say, “Hey Siri” and the music will mute and Siri will respond 🤯
SIRI (along with "Hey GOOGLE") IS the quintessential stalker.
I’ve never used Siri ever. It does what I can just do for myself. Unless there’s some features I’m missing out on. But setting reminders, timers, grocery lists, or whatever else I can do on my own. That’s stuff I should look to see it’s done right anyway. So why not just do it.
There’s that old quote “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.” Cases like this have and will continue to prove that it’s no longer even about safety, we’re being tracked in everything we do in return for a few mere seconds of convenience.
Same! Daughter has one in EVERY room of her apartment and thinks its the best thing ever. 😢
SO WHAT YOU'RE SAYING,..
Is there will be a Terms Of Service Update real soon 😂
.... time to find that ONE Extra Hidden Word 🤣
You are not paranoid ENOUGH. Consider: recent phones make it virtually impossible for the user to remove the battery. They claim that this is to improve moisture resistance, but the actual reason is that your phone can be doing things even if you have shut it down. The mic and camera can be activated without giving any indication, and the data can be transmitted without a user even being aware that their phone is active while they think it is turned off.
Formerly, you could ensure your complete privacy by removing the battery, but now the only way is to completely wrap the device in metal, thus making a Faraday cage, and preventing any electromagnetic signals from getting to or from your device ... but be aware that you can HEAR through aluminium foil, and the recordings can be transmitted the next time your device connects to any network.
Several years ago I bought a brand new 55"
Samsung smart tv with all the bells & whistles. A co-worker asked me if I knew that it listened and possibly recorded my speech in my own home. I didn't believe it possible but after looking into it I found out he was right. It's all in the micro print legalese of the TOS or whatever. Now I just assume even the toaster is listening.
When you say "ok Google" and a message pops up on your android phone saying that the Google Assistant isn't enabled.
Two nights ago I was watching TV and suddenly my Android phone said "ok, your alarm is set for 9:30". I said not a word. But some character on the TV was saying something about "in a few hours" or something like that. And it triggered the 'droid.
Seen this coming 10 miles away
Yep
Now you're going to get ads for EVERYTHING ten miles away
@@srt1749 🤣🤣🤣
Now do Facebook, Amazon and Google.
Can't tell you how many times I've talked to someone about something or other, and then start getting ads for it. I only notice it when it is something unusual, a specific old movie, a musical instrument that I don't own or ever search for, etc. Or my son tells me about a video he thinks I should check out, and next time I open TH-cam it shows up in the recommended videos.
They all sell ad data between themselves. Doesn't matter who listened, they will all get it.
While listening to this video Siri activated
You must sound a lot like Steve because Siri knows your voice so it won’t respond to other people trying to use it.
Drinking game, take a 🥃 every time you hear "Accidently"
I so agree with Steve. Years ago I expressed concern over ads and pop-ups saying, example, it is 26 mins to a bar I drink at. I would say, this is scary. What is going on? Everyone said "you are already drunk" Well, time has passed and I guess I was not crazy. Steve, you should talk about cars and the cameras and microphones the have INSIDE the car.
My mom would be talking in her house, and goigle would pop up and say, i can help you with that, and she would turn around and say, i wasnt talking to you!!! *sigh* another time i was talking with a friend over coffee, and the phone , on the table,like a third person in the room, popped up with "want to scold anyone else?!?!?!" in response
So often my wife will be shopping for some item on her computer and the search results show up as ads on my computer.
That's because, as she will likely attest, you don't listen to her!
Computers on the same network
Absolutely, my wife and I noticed that too, so we tried stuff we would never need or want and bam it showed up. What a shame this happened. The payout and settlement is nothing but a coward's way out. They next time need to be very costly.
It’s happened to me.
We have no privacy.
I'm commenting before watching, but I do want to say that (afaik) this lawsuit was over contractors who listened to the audio of accidental captures, not a systematic ad network.
Facebook did this too, but they *said* that they quit listening. Scout GPS still does it AFAIK, so if you are pairing your phone to your car's infotainment system, you may have it listening as well. I figure that Google and Amazon probably bleed off their received audio to advertisers or their respective AI's too.
I realized this in 2016 when I joked about buying a money counter. I got back in my car and checked face book and had ads for money counters..
I had my android phone and Google maps navigation change a specific and specialized destination in mid-navigation and subsequently take me to another of the same type of location based entirely on either eavesdropping on my conversation or texts. The incident made me a believer.
The Google AI assistant and Siri assistant can be shut off in the settings. That's what I did as I was talking to someone about the weather which I think it was during summer and I said scorcher and Siri activated. Same with Google - say anything that sounds like Hey Google or Google and it listens. I'd rather press and hold the home button to activate rather than have them listening.
Now for a class action suit against google. On many occasions I have mentioned something on my flip phone and within 24 hours I get an add for it on utube.
It does this all the time... but my phone shows me what my wife says and her phone shows her things I say...
Did a government intelligence agency pay Apple for the snooping?
About a year ago me and my wife were talking about how I need new windows for my house next thing. You know, we're getting all kinds of ADS for companies that install windows. Imagine that.
The only people who win in class action lawsuits are the Lawyers. Everyone else gets something like 59 cents and a coupon.
The people will get $1.33 and the lawyers who weren't affected by this will get $33 Million each....
I'm betting that the Attorney's get $65 million!
That leaves us pennies...
😱😬🤬
The lawyers had to fight this for 6 years and incurred the costs for that
@christopherg2347 yes sir and their time and cost is worth 10s of Millions lol gotcha
Aren't 99% of "representatives" lawyers too? Boy, where would the world be without em
@@dtcdtc8328 Nobody would take up class action lawsuits and the companies never loose anything for their misdeeds.
No idea why you think that world would be better.
The word smart is an acronym S.M.A.R.T. which stands for: Self Monitoring And REPORTING Technology.
You have to ask yourself "Just who is it reporting all your data to?"
I actually installed a physical micro-switch on my phone that directly disables the microphone.
Haven't had any incidents of eavesdropping...aka coincidental advertisements...from it since.
Ben is up at bat today :)
By definition, any voice activated product would need to constantly listen to be able to respond. Once my wife decided to get a smart home assistant, we gave up on the notion of privacy in our home. :)
* Turns off Siri
"Hey Siri"
"You currently have me disabled" - Siri
Meanwhile every time Steve said Siri she responded lol!
Siri knows your voice so unless you sound like Steve it wouldn’t activate hearing him say it.
@@timduncan6750 Yes it's supposed to know my voice. I did train it to do so, but others say SIRI and occasionally she asks WHAT??? Steve's voice works!
relax, it's nothing nefarious, they're just listening, for ''sh_ts and giggles''
I'm a software engineer and I can tell you that there is no way this is accidental and it's not limited to iOS. Apple was just the first to get too relaxed with data mining and people could finally prove they weren't paranoid and that the eavesdropping was real.
Breaking it down at the most basic level, you trigger Siri with a key phrase right? How can it pair the sound of the phrase if it's not listening, it can't. That doesn't mean it's bad but it does mean there is room for malicious exploitation, designed exploitation, or just human error with the engineering. It's not unreasonable to think that it's probable that one of those things could happen.
The intent is easily proven though by monitoring. Apple would be monitoring the quantity of Siri triggers, questions asked, and answered to make sure it's working as expected and that they improve. You would expect X amount of triggers and the duration of the part where it listens for a question. They honestly say accidentally when hours of listening are happening daily per device when normally it should be 20 seconds here, 30 there, etc.
Had a conversation with my wife about diapers. We have never once discussed this nor searched for it online. The next day, I am getting ads for Diapers. Android devices.
Apple: it's the cost of doing business. It's peanuts🥜
Last year or so I was doing some renovations and mentioned to my husband I wasn’t sure if I should go with Lowe’s or Home Depot. Got an email within the hour showing ads from BOTH of these competitors in a single email. No coincidence.
How many times have people said this and these idiots say it's not happening. Well there ya go. Nobody is consenting to this.
There is no proof this ever happened. It's just gut feeling, and I hope they'll lose. Paranoia should not be leading the discourse.
@@IkarusKommt What part of the class action didn't happen? Are you paying attention? They've been sued for spying.
Siri woke up and started listening to Steve while I was watching this video.
Same and Steve never said the wake command just Siri instead of Hey Siri.
Though this ones an actual accidental activation.
What they need to explain is the ones where it activates and deactivates silently hoping you don’t notice. Despite the only mode allowing silent activation being off.
🦋 My dad and my uncle were having a conversation and my dad said ' I should give Mara a call' next thing he knew he heard my voice from the other room😂 turns out his cell called me 😅 🦋
I got ads related to stuff I had discussed but never searched on my Android but that's been about a year ago and earlier. I guess they saw the writing on the wall from the Apple lawsuit and preemptively stopped this practice.
It isn't just Siri, and I wouldn't be surprised if they all do it. Some years ago, 2019 or so, I was in the car with my mother and made a comment about how a certain author had written cameos of a certain kind of s*x toy in multiple of their stories, which I'd found a little strange. It wasn't something I'd ever mentioned before or would have ever searched for, written or texted anyone about. Later that day, at home on my computer, what kind of ads do you think my browser started showing? I was mortified. And I didn't even have Siri, that was an Android phone.
Got my Verizon wireless settlement money today. Was supposed to be 15 dollars plus a dollar for every month Verizon charged fake fees up to 100 dollars payment max, but got a whopping 14 dollars. Was expecting 100. Class action lawsuits are attorney scams. 😂
Nothing accidental about it. Google does the same thing.
I'm thinking they really settled to avoid Discovery.
So let me get this right -
lawyers make tens of thousands
people in suit make 20 bucks each
apple / slap on wrist
Yea, sounds like typical court in America !
THAT'S AMERICAN JUSTICE
and you get screwed again.
3:00 Love your "stupid" voice, made me laugh.
Who is the toaster talking to? Might be the washing machine. It uses 3 GB everyday. 😂
That's not even pennies on the dollar of their advertising profits.
It literally just happened yesterday where my dad replied to my mom sarcastically "Thank you" and without missing a beat Siri responded "You're welcome"
The toaster is talking to the fridge!...😂😂
f they have a kid, would it be a crock-pot??
That is why I have switched phone carriers, and bought a Fairphone. The phone isn't the best phone I have ever owned, but it doesn't spy on me. Your data is also only as secure as the apps that you give access to your phone.
No such thing as an app that doesn’t collect data
oh so the lawyers won again
Years ago a radio station host here in Australia did the experiment. The plan was to mention “cuckoo clocks” in conversation to see if adverts for cuckoo clocks started appearing on their phone. It took less than a day.
On an old flip phone, over a decade ago, I took a pic of a dog cage at the store I was in and sent it in a text...then I got bombarded with ads for dog crates! By now we should all know this is a thing.
It’s just the price of doing business for Apple. They should be fined an amount relative to their Company’s value. It has to hurt, or nothing changes.
It’s nice to see these tech companies held accountable - by what’s essentially less than a slap on the wrist.
Don't forget that the settlement and its associated "costs" is also a tax deduction for apple.
A disappointed glance is a better analogy
@2:03: "Specifical." Steve's digging into archaic English! 🤣
My family use to play a game where we randomly grab the name of a product that nobody in the family used or had interest in. We never said the word out loud, we wrote it down on a piece of paper. Once everyone agreed on the word, while sitting at the dinner table with our phones turned off next to our plate, we all started to use sentences containing the word for 5 minutes. Most of the fun was thinking of crazy ways to use the word in a sentence. The game was, whoever’s phone gave them the ad first after talking about it for five minutes would win. Surprisingly, the people who won the most were the ones that spent the least amount of time on their phone, especially doing social media. I am not sure how that plays into the algorithm.
By the way, I’ve told other people about this game before, and they went and played it at home and got the same results.
The TOASTER!?!? And here I was thinking I just had to be careful what I say around the TV!
Damn TV is waaay too sensitive!
Seriously though - a couple months ago I started getting ads in Spanish. I do not speak Spanish. Very annoying!
I have a couple friends who are multilingual. I had been out shopping with one and wondered if it was possible she had used my phone to Google something. Service is all kinds of spotty and weird where I live. One phone will work where another won't - it seemed like a reasonable explanation. But no, she hadn't searched anything, nothing.
I just realized we got manicures, the tech did not speak English well. My friend spoke Spanish with her the entire time we were there. I was playing games on my phone until it was my turn.
I have all voice activated garbage on my phone turned off - it keeps popping up wanting me to talk text.
I guess I know why I have Spanish ads now.
Fortunately I usually throw the phone in the backpack where it immediately deep dives to the bottom. Hence no ads in Albanian, Czech, German, etc.
My Samsung out of no where would suddenly say” I’m sorry I didn’t hear you”!
My iPhone while just sitting Siri will come on and just spin like I asked it a question. We don’t have to worry about big brother we’ve went and bought the products and volunteered our own info up 24 hrs a day.
Exactly. Obama and the NSA- if you didn’t know that then that’s a shame. All of them do it. They collect and sell your data without consent. If any person did this- they’d be prosecuted for conducting research without consent.
I asked Siri what she thought about the eavesdropping case and Siri stopped working. She wouldn’t respond to me. But a few minutes later, she finally responded to Steve saying “Siri.”
Oh boy ! I'm going to get a 35 cent coupon !
3:30 - If my toaster was listening to me, it wouldn't burn my toast. Then again, I might have a spiteful toaster !
Who in the hell negotiated this settlement!?
Steve, no joke, I was watching this video on full volume while cooking dinner and at about 2:35 Siri on my Apple IPhone started talking about setting or something.
Facebook and Google are always accidentally listening and giving you ads based on your conversations.
Android does the same thing and it started 6 to 10 years ago I'm not sure if it's Google on Android or what but just very obscure things like a laser cutter mentioned at a lunch meeting and then I get an advertisement for a laser cutter
We definitely have " ghosts in the machinery " now days
Does it only include Apple device owners? What if I had been recorded while talking to an Apple device owner?
Good question! Since it's per device, probably doesn't matter. I have had TH-cam recommendations based on obscure things other people said near my phone.
Had this happen numerous times with my iPhones. Sitting poolside with some friends on a lazy Sunday afternoon. Some of the guys were smoking cigars. I declined on since I quit them many years earlier. When I got home, there were cigar ads on my PC. Another time it happened with car tires on my office PC. Sick stuff.