I put a wireshark filter on the network to watch for any packets leaving the echo. I let it run for a month and a half and it never once sent anything until I finally said the wake word.
I used actual hardware firewall to snoop into echo's wifi activity and it still runs even when I don't invoke it (one of the good ways to hopefully prevent seeing recordings is to mute the mic).
The difference is the Alexas purpose is to send the recordings to amazon. The phone would have to be hacked or have malicious programs on it to send recordings to the mic
TheGeekPub Feel free to record my boring life.. What more important, is that shrimpy arcade mame or a jamma? I have a 300lb tank that has around 6000 games. Her name is Big Burtha.. I pet her when nobody is looking... Don't tell anyone!
I think I know why people make a fuss about Alexa it's like instead of everything else. It's far easier to associate a voice and personality with spying then the equivilant of a book or life journal. The mental connection can be drawn even if someone is not tech savy. Which is easier to blame? The life journal that is Facebook, or talking box that you ask questions every day?
Hey I just started watching your videos because I am building a home network of my own. Your videos are really helpful. So seeing your security camera set up made me think “man I’d be so screwed if my parents had one of those back when I was in High school” and it made me think, have you ever caught your kids sneaking out or anything else on them? I don’t have kids yet but it makes me think, I’m gonna monitor everything they do online and even more if I get security cameras. do I want to be that type of parent? Do you have cameras in the rooms of your house? Also why Alexa over google Home?
No cameras in the rooms. Only in the common areas. But we require the kids to stay in the common areas when they have friends over. We don't monitor their cellphones, but I do take them and look them over if they give me cause to suspect they are lying about something.
Ask the right question: what should my Alexa be doing under normal circumstances? Assuming you’ve segmented off your Internet of Turd device build a firewall rule that only allows the device(s) an outbound only connection to the Alexa API, on the ports it needs, be state full set a rate limit, time of day etc etc.
Was I the only one distracted by the Super Mario Brothers game? I feel Anythink connecting to the internet can be hacked remotely. I am very skeptical on that.
Mrs Richards: " I paid for a room with a view!" Basil: (pointing to the lovely view) "That is Torquay, Madam." Mrs Richards: "It's not good enough!" Basil: "May I ask what you were expecting to see out of a Torquay hotel bedroom window? Sydney Opera House, perhaps? the Hanging Gardens of Babylon? Herds of wildebeest sweeping majestically past?..." Mrs Richards: "Don't be silly! I expect to be able to see the sea!" Basil: "You can see the sea, it's over there between the land and the sky." Mrs Richards: "I'm not satisfied. But I shall stay. But I expect a reduction." Basil: "Why?! Because Krakatoa's not erupting at the moment ?
Excellent video! I really appreciated the content! Happy to have some recourse for when my ISO talks trash about Alexa! One critique, the super Mario in the background is immensely distracting in the talking head setting! I hope you are still making videos!
personally i don’t trust Alexa or my phone or any website. the only reason i have a smart phone is because i have low vision and need to magnify, get directions ect.
My daughter woke up I the middle of the night and found that Alexa had turned on all her lights... and I have to ask was Alexa checking out her home... and what woke her up... was Alexa sending some signal or frequency??? Since she got Alexa she finds she's waking all the time and having a hard time getting to sleep again...
I still don't understand why people think Alexa would spy on you, like, why would Alexa, spy on you, out of millions of people, why would they spy on you? And why would they even want to spy on you? It just doesn't make sense and is false paranoia. And yeah these people will complain about Alexa but they have their phones and their computers. Its really contradictory.
ah cool so does your firewall have a secondary network connection with a SPAN port on your switches to monitor internal traffic or does it only monitor traffic between WAN and LAN ?
Besides the fact that Porn sites are generally clean because they literally make money through traffic in their site. Sure, the sketchier no name ones probably have drive-by attacks embedded into their page, but a good AV will catch those most times and not even let you go to the page. Mainstream sites are gonna be squeaky clean for the most part though.
You're simply repeating what Amazon said about the device. This is not 'hard hitting' or 'fact finding' in any way. The truth is, we don't know what Amazon is doing with the data.
Its not about asking her... its about that she is simply listeining to what tou saying (or at least might do) all the time. And this is something that you dont want when you talking to your bussiness partner lets say, or wife in bed, or...
I think I covered that pretty well. The device has a key word that it is listening for in an always on circuit. That circuit is not tied to the internet. This is why you can only change it to a three or four words. Its in solid state. This is no different than how Siri works. My point again is if you don't trust Alexa you should not own a cell phone.
If you want privacy, put your computer and yourself in a Faraday Cage, use only locally run software, and stay off the internet. Otherwise expect to be "seen" and "heard" by others. It has been that way from the beginning: My first computer was a CDC Cyber,,,on a 110 baud modem. Viva La Revolution 1975.
i run privacy badger and ublock origin to take care of most trackers. also there is a difference between what you type into a web browser and what you say out loud that an echo dot may or may not be listening to. also i don't use facebook twitter instagram or snapchat what a waste of time. XD
the strength of his position is a straw man logical fallacy. I know there are other security holes in my life (facebook, my phone, etc)...what about THIS ONE? What parts of Echo's are and/or are not secure? Did you test it with packet sniffing? Have you tried restricting it's network access to see if it still worked okay? Have you hacked it to the command line and tried to ping other objects behind your firewall? I didn't really expect anything super solid coming to TH-cam. Hardline hackers don't really make videos they sorta need to remain anonymous, but maybe a TH-camr knows one and can relay the information well.... I'll keep searching I guess.
It's not a straw man argument in the least. There is nothing strawman about saying "You're demonizing this, but the bigger demon in your pocket gets a free pass."
i'd rather build my own security camera system you don't know whats happening with that data and if they ever decide to stop supporting them you are hosed time to go spend more hard earned cash on another set
For stopping the like button google analytic ect look at quidsips NoTrack project along with PiHole then maybe an adblocking and noscript browser addon to go along with that proper firewall. Also junk any modem comcast gives you damn thing is a public network that for the Xfinity anywhere thing that and its slower than any docsis 3.0 modem you can buy for 80$ shaving that 14$ rental fee from that unfortunately trying to find a modem with the telephony ports comcast uses for their phone lines are like $250+. For the most part i have one question alexa still needs to listen for keywords how can i trust it not to be recording before that we KNOW from the article you mentioned that you need physical access to make it into a bug but that was not what the article had to say alone it also mentioned that it still heard while in its standby phase it is unknown if that is transmitted at all.
Apparently everything. I have numerous AIs in my house. If I said to "give up" I would have told you to get rid of them. Instead I told you the best method of protection is to make sure your firewall and malware software is configured properly and if so to not worry about it and enjoy your AI.
Wrong. Alexa has a far more advanced microphone and is built for the specific purpose of listening to what you say. Bad or good, that's what it does, it listens to every word you say and it does what you tell it to do.
Rob Claggy i don't trust my smartphone either, i have disabled the gps, and i have tape on the cameras :v, i dont install apps that have access to my camera or my gps, still i know there is some telemetry in every program i use.....
@@TheGeekPub Exactly, that's my point. Just because your phone is a security risk doesn't mean your Alexa isn't as well. You presented a whataboutist argument, instead of actually tackling the issue at hand.
"We should not be worried about alexa sitting and listening when we're typing all this data into the internet." -- WRONG. You missed the point of peoples argument. Alexa is listening to everything. This is not the same as typing on the internet. Your keyboard does not hear your private conversations.
Listening, recording, and transmitting are entirely different concepts. Your smoke detector is sensing for smoke and your alarm is sensing for motion 24/7. That doesn’t mean it’s reporting to the alarm company your movement around the house.
Of course not, because that would be extremely inefficient. Alexa absolutely could however have other trigger words and phrases such as oh I don't know "kidnap" or "cocaine" or "I'm gonna kill you". Don't present your opinion as fact.
Like I said. If it wasn't listening all the time it's never hear commands. I love how you people eat up everything corporations feed you without using your basic thought processes.
Your phone isn’t listening to everything you say and sending it back to the company that you bought it from. You make some really bad unproven arguments in this video. You lost a ton of my trust in this channel with this video. I agree that you probably don’t need to worry about your amazon echo, but you went off the tinfoil hat deep end at the end of the video.
dcast777 spoken like a true imbecile. Google assistant and Siri are doing the exact same thing alexa is doing. They listen 24/7 for their keywords. Also, you obviously know nothing about technology because if you did you'd know that Mike is a pretty big deal in the technology community outside of TH-cam. This dude knows his stuff. Who the hell are you?
I put a wireshark filter on the network to watch for any packets leaving the echo. I let it run for a month and a half and it never once sent anything until I finally said the wake word.
Right now that may be true. Look up "Dolphin Attack" though and see if you think you're safe now.
I used actual hardware firewall to snoop into echo's wifi activity and it still runs even when I don't invoke it (one of the good ways to hopefully prevent seeing recordings is to mute the mic).
@@t3ch-1t89 what do you mean with it still runs?
As I expected, the comments are getting full of people that still swear Alexa is evil, but their phone is God.
People don't like logic and reason. You've seen the presidential debates right? :-)
The difference is the Alexas purpose is to send the recordings to amazon. The phone would have to be hacked or have malicious programs on it to send recordings to the mic
That moment when you see your comment in a TheGeekPub video.
I--I don't know, Doc. Are you sure I'm okay? I--I just don't know if it's safe yet.
Is Alexa safe or she she snooping on everything you say! The truth is much less menacing, but where there is smoke there's probably a bigger fire!
TheGeekPub
Feel free to record my boring life..
What more important, is that shrimpy arcade mame or a jamma?
I have a 300lb tank that has around 6000 games. Her name is Big Burtha..
I pet her when nobody is looking... Don't tell anyone!
But my Alexa is in a meth lab?!
you should make a shirt with tin foil hats - the comments are so fun to read
LOL
I think I know why people make a fuss about Alexa it's like instead of everything else. It's far easier to associate a voice and personality with spying then the equivilant of a book or life journal. The mental connection can be drawn even if someone is not tech savy. Which is easier to blame? The life journal that is Facebook, or talking box that you ask questions every day?
This is interesting insight! Thanks for the comment!
Hey I just started watching your videos because I am building a home network of my own. Your videos are really helpful. So seeing your security camera set up made me think “man I’d be so screwed if my parents had one of those back when I was in High school” and it made me think, have you ever caught your kids sneaking out or anything else on them? I don’t have kids yet but it makes me think, I’m gonna monitor everything they do online and even more if I get security cameras. do I want to be that type of parent? Do you have cameras in the rooms of your house?
Also why Alexa over google Home?
No cameras in the rooms. Only in the common areas. But we require the kids to stay in the common areas when they have friends over. We don't monitor their cellphones, but I do take them and look them over if they give me cause to suspect they are lying about something.
Great video :D
You make great points about all of the other devices we have that could be listening to us. Very eye opening :)
Ask the right question: what should my Alexa be doing under normal circumstances?
Assuming you’ve segmented off your Internet of Turd device build a firewall rule that only allows the device(s) an outbound only connection to the Alexa API, on the ports it needs, be state full set a rate limit, time of day etc etc.
If you have a smartphone no point complaining about Alexa. Your phone will give away your location on top of everything else.
Exactly the point of this video.
That orange computer in the back is in desperate need of some retrobright
Was I the only one distracted by the Super Mario Brothers game? I feel Anythink connecting to the internet can be hacked remotely. I am very skeptical on that.
GAH!!!!!! Your saying of "the name that shall not be said" is making mine go nuts! ;-) LOL
The Amazon Echo can spy on me ...I sit in my Shackleton high seat chair most of the day. Watching Jeremy Kyle then Loose Women. 😂
Mrs Richards: " I paid for a room with a view!"
Basil: (pointing to the lovely view) "That is Torquay, Madam."
Mrs Richards: "It's not good enough!"
Basil: "May I ask what you were expecting to see out of a Torquay hotel bedroom window? Sydney Opera House, perhaps? the Hanging Gardens of Babylon? Herds of wildebeest sweeping majestically past?..."
Mrs Richards: "Don't be silly! I expect to be able to see the sea!"
Basil: "You can see the sea, it's over there between the land and the sky."
Mrs Richards: "I'm not satisfied. But I shall stay. But I expect a reduction."
Basil: "Why?! Because Krakatoa's not erupting at the moment ?
Are any pre-oct 2017 Alex's still vulnerable up the mentioned vulnerability?
Yes, if you have the device in your hand, disassembled, a soldering iron, and some specific components to solder to the board.
Excellent video! I really appreciated the content! Happy to have some recourse for when my ISO talks trash about Alexa!
One critique, the super Mario in the background is immensely distracting in the talking head setting!
I hope you are still making videos!
Tbh I could care less, a bunch of other devices like phones also listen.
are you going to retrobrithe the apple 2 in the background or do you like it better that way
Good question. It’s all about time.
but.. but.. but.. why else would I be on the internet? 8:10 :D
I knew people would say that. You win!
Update?
im here with USG4p, and for some reason i get many IPS alert everyday, is that a normal thing to happen ?
Yep. Bad actors scan the internet all day long.
personally i don’t trust Alexa or my phone or any website. the only reason i have a smart phone is because i have low vision and need to magnify, get directions ect.
I don't trust those smart AI/Assistant
yiy dawg. i think the point be you shood not trust ya phone then.
My daughter woke up I the middle of the night and found that Alexa had turned on all her lights... and I have to ask was Alexa checking out her home... and what woke her up... was Alexa sending some signal or frequency??? Since she got Alexa she finds she's waking all the time and having a hard time getting to sleep again...
I still don't understand why people think Alexa would spy on you, like, why would Alexa, spy on you, out of millions of people, why would they spy on you? And why would they even want to spy on you? It just doesn't make sense and is false paranoia. And yeah these people will complain about Alexa but they have their phones and their computers. Its really contradictory.
do you have an IDPS on your network ? (intrusion detection and prevention system)
Yes. Via pfSense.
ah cool so does your firewall have a secondary network connection with a SPAN port on your switches to monitor internal traffic or does it only monitor traffic between WAN and LAN ?
You can do it either way. It's got 8 gig ports on it.
My dad thinks Alexa is evil LOL
What you don’t address is what they interpret as a keyword. We all know that Siri and Ok Google have been invoked without saying it.
In response to 4:15, there is Bryan Lunduke's "The Internet of Things is going to destroy us all" at url th-cam.com/video/304Lcn0nU3c/w-d-xo.html .
Ask Alexa what a Google is once. Once should be enough.
What does Alexa reply with?
Earned a subscriber from your 8bit
"Today we're going to answer the question is Alexa safe, or is she a snooping device?"
Why not both? :-P
Using internet without porn, pirate and streaming sites is like using a car with one gear: it moves - but it's no fun at all. ;))
Besides the fact that Porn sites are generally clean because they literally make money through traffic in their site. Sure, the sketchier no name ones probably have drive-by attacks embedded into their page, but a good AV will catch those most times and not even let you go to the page. Mainstream sites are gonna be squeaky clean for the most part though.
You're simply repeating what Amazon said about the device. This is not 'hard hitting' or 'fact finding' in any way. The truth is, we don't know what Amazon is doing with the data.
Its not about asking her... its about that she is simply listeining to what tou saying (or at least might do) all the time. And this is something that you dont want when you talking to your bussiness partner lets say, or wife in bed, or...
I think I covered that pretty well. The device has a key word that it is listening for in an always on circuit. That circuit is not tied to the internet. This is why you can only change it to a three or four words. Its in solid state.
This is no different than how Siri works. My point again is if you don't trust Alexa you should not own a cell phone.
Good video... a lot of the home security stuff is common sense
I love your channel. Keep it up!
If you want privacy, put your computer and yourself in a Faraday Cage, use only locally run software, and stay off the internet. Otherwise expect to be "seen" and "heard" by others. It has been that way from the beginning: My first computer was a CDC Cyber,,,on a 110 baud modem. Viva La Revolution 1975.
Looking forward to the update on the rigs!
Timing. It's taking longer than I expected, but its going to be awesome!
I was gonna subscribe to this channel until I watched this video.
Hey I thought the piece of software that watches and listens to u is called a spyware
i dont trust alexa but i dont trust my phone, my mic on my headphones too, so go for it or leave all of these? :)
i run privacy badger and ublock origin to take care of most trackers. also there is a difference between what you type into a web browser and what you say out loud that an echo dot may or may not be listening to. also i don't use facebook twitter instagram or snapchat what a waste of time. XD
the strength of his position is a straw man logical fallacy. I know there are other security holes in my life (facebook, my phone, etc)...what about THIS ONE? What parts of Echo's are and/or are not secure? Did you test it with packet sniffing? Have you tried restricting it's network access to see if it still worked okay? Have you hacked it to the command line and tried to ping other objects behind your firewall? I didn't really expect anything super solid coming to TH-cam. Hardline hackers don't really make videos they sorta need to remain anonymous, but maybe a TH-camr knows one and can relay the information well.... I'll keep searching I guess.
It's not a straw man argument in the least. There is nothing strawman about saying "You're demonizing this, but the bigger demon in your pocket gets a free pass."
What's the Innernet?
They have used voice recordings from alexa in court cases several times now. So no alexa is not even remotely secure.
False. Do 30 seconds of research please.
Awesome stuff! I subscribe.
its sent to the master computer -dale from king of the hill
Alexa do you work for the fbi
She works for Jeff Bezos. ;-)
Was visiting my cousin the other night and told Alexa to record and send the next hour of our conversation to the FBI. I wonder if she did that?
Alexa: I can neither confirm nor deny.
i'd rather build my own security camera system you don't know whats happening with that data and if they ever decide to stop supporting them you are hosed time to go spend more hard earned cash on another set
Destroy the evidence
Why is Mario going on its oun?
"Amazon cares about the quality of life and it's customers"
Sure.
I don't believe I said that.
No, not you.
I hope they don't run Alexa as they run Twitch, hahaha
For stopping the like button google analytic ect look at quidsips NoTrack project along with PiHole then maybe an adblocking and noscript browser addon to go along with that proper firewall.
Also junk any modem comcast gives you damn thing is a public network that for the Xfinity anywhere thing that and its slower than any docsis 3.0 modem you can buy for 80$ shaving that 14$ rental fee from that unfortunately trying to find a modem with the telephony ports comcast uses for their phone lines are like $250+.
For the most part i have one question alexa still needs to listen for keywords how can i trust it not to be recording before that we KNOW from the article you mentioned that you need physical access to make it into a bug but that was not what the article had to say alone it also mentioned that it still heard while in its standby phase it is unknown if that is transmitted at all.
MWR specifically stated they found no evidence of Alexa transmitting data outside of the its activation keyword.
Fuck the whole cloud! So long i can't get an a.i. disconnected from the internet, i don't want it. Btw, what you basically said is "give up"
Actually, I said exactly the opposite.
What did i misunderstand?
Apparently everything. I have numerous AIs in my house. If I said to "give up" I would have told you to get rid of them. Instead I told you the best method of protection is to make sure your firewall and malware software is configured properly and if so to not worry about it and enjoy your AI.
I also want a pet!
i don't trust Alexa >:V
Then why do you trust your smartphone? I think that's the major point being made here.
That's exactly my point. If you fear Alexa you shouldn't own a smartphone.
Wrong. Alexa has a far more advanced microphone and is built for the specific purpose of listening to what you say. Bad or good, that's what it does, it listens to every word you say and it does what you tell it to do.
This is 100% false Bombsquad. Amazon licensed Apple's Siri technology for keyword listening.
Rob Claggy i don't trust my smartphone either, i have disabled the gps, and i have tape on the cameras :v, i dont install apps that have access to my camera or my gps, still i know there is some telemetry in every program i use.....
I'm going to test it, I'm going to say I'm going to destroy the world..LOL😁
_link to the stupid video "amazon alexa gone wild" here_
Great channel and I love the shirt... 8bit guy ( david rocks ) Subscribed! I agree first start worrying about your network *Ubiqiuiti User*
People are so paranoid these days. Im amazed peope still go outside :D
No porn sites? Nooooooo
Also you are presuming you actually know what code is running alexa at any given time.
This has been researched by security firms ad nauseum.
Your argument boils down to whataboutism. Just because there's other potential security risks with other devices that doesn't make Alexa any better.
Actually no. My argument boils down to "Your phone is the biggest risk you carry and you ignore it."
@@TheGeekPub Exactly, that's my point. Just because your phone is a security risk doesn't mean your Alexa isn't as well. You presented a whataboutist argument, instead of actually tackling the issue at hand.
Hmm...
kek
i don't have any of those things in my flat
only nokia 6060
tsartomato Then how are you watching this video...
on my pc duh
and it has no cameras or mics and i don't use social network and don't give them any data
Am a zone
"We should not be worried about alexa sitting and listening when we're typing all this data into the internet." -- WRONG. You missed the point of peoples argument. Alexa is listening to everything. This is not the same as typing on the internet. Your keyboard does not hear your private conversations.
LOL. You know your keyboard is wireless and transmits every key it presses right?
If it didn't hear every word you say it would never hear "Alexa". Case closed.
Listening, recording, and transmitting are entirely different concepts. Your smoke detector is sensing for smoke and your alarm is sensing for motion 24/7. That doesn’t mean it’s reporting to the alarm company your movement around the house.
Of course not, because that would be extremely inefficient. Alexa absolutely could however have other trigger words and phrases such as oh I don't know "kidnap" or "cocaine" or "I'm gonna kill you". Don't present your opinion as fact.
Like I said. If it wasn't listening all the time it's never hear commands. I love how you people eat up everything corporations feed you without using your basic thought processes.
Everything can be used for everything. Nothing / no one is safe for 100% It's an illusion.
Seems you are a naive believer.
No. I just understand technology.
It wasn't nice... so I don't mind calling you an idiot going strait into lion's mouth with a smile on face.
"Don't worry about x because y is worse" is a really bad argument.
It was designed to get you thinking about the stuff you should really be worrying about.
Your phone isn’t listening to everything you say and sending it back to the company that you bought it from. You make some really bad unproven arguments in this video. You lost a ton of my trust in this channel with this video. I agree that you probably don’t need to worry about your amazon echo, but you went off the tinfoil hat deep end at the end of the video.
What? So Siri and OK google aren't listening 24/7 for their keywords? What kind of pixie dust magic do they posses???
dcast777 spoken like a true imbecile. Google assistant and Siri are doing the exact same thing alexa is doing. They listen 24/7 for their keywords. Also, you obviously know nothing about technology because if you did you'd know that Mike is a pretty big deal in the technology community outside of TH-cam. This dude knows his stuff. Who the hell are you?
Android allows you to disable the microphone and camera apps.
How do you know that it is really disabled?
My Siri isn't listening for the keyword because I have it shut off.