Google accidentally enables home smart speakers to listen in to everyday sounds | Hacker News Reader

Google accidentally enables home smart speakers to listen in to everyday sounds

independent.co.uk

59 pointsaprdm21 comments

Events like this is why I will never get a smart speaker in my house. If it can be remotely updated to be triggered by something as innocuous as popped bubble wrap, then why can't it be remotely updated to be triggered by, well, anything?

Same; they really need a push-to-talk-only mode and multiple LEDs inline with the mic power line.

This is actually interesting - Apple Research (when it was a thing) apparently did some testing for voice activated assistants in early aughts (or maybe even before, before they were disbanded by Jobs), and the conclusion was that push to talk presents a much better user experience. I heard this story at Microsoft Research from the researcher who did this work at Apple previously. Her name escapes me at the moment, however.

Anecdotally, I would very much prefer push-to-talk myself, actually. I don't understand why companies are so resistant to the idea. Google even has all the hardware necessary (although I would prefer a positive, tactile response when I engage the assistant).

I would also like a pure text mode assistant in my phone, for the situation where voice commands would be awkward or impossible (due to noise etc).

>Anecdotally, I would very much prefer push-to-talk myself, actually. I don't understand why companies are so resistant to the idea. Google even has all the hardware necessary (although I would prefer a positive, tactile response when I engage the assistant).

Maybe because they do not want to have the best Ux, and their goal is probably something different - like "accidentally" gathering data.

Having worked at Google, I doubt this very much. I'm 100% certain it's a bug. I do not believe in malice on the part of Google in anything that does not have to do with ads. If it's ads, all bets are off.

The problem is that many at Google don't necessarily see the problem in gathering data. That's not just Google, at many companies engineers prefer gathering more data rather than less, as it makes debugging easier and aides future feature development. The downsides are rarely seen.

There are other possible goals. This kind of accidental gathered data is legally toxic.

In this case, I presume it is about friction while shopping. If you say aloud 'I want a dollhouse' and one is delivered to your house, more money is earned. When you need 10 seconds to walk to the device, thats 10 seconds to think if you really need it.

In theory, the free market should detect that a customer need is not met, and someone should provide an alternative.

This not happening is a clear signal that there is a too powerfull monopoly/oligipoly/cartel at work, and governemental intervention is required.

But you still have to walk to the device - any kind of a significant distance in anything but a completely silent room turns speech recognition into a game of broken telephone. And you most certainly aren't buying something as elaborate as a doll house through voice. Voice is best suited for things you routinely re-buy, such as coffee beans, cat food, etc.

And then there are devices like watches and phones that are always on you and walking to a device is not a concern.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/1/7/14200210/amazon-alexa-tech...

You might be interested in setting up your own smart speaker hardware powered by Almond server https://github.com/stanford-oval/almond-server

Nore info https://almond.stanford.edu/

Google home is totally useless if you don't let Google track you on the web. Any question you ask, it tells you to enable web history. Wish I could get a refund, honestly. This is idiocy.

Soon it will be difficult to buy TV sets, smart watches and cars without this functionality...

Just wait until a domestic terrorism incident happens. You cannot audit who has access to this thing. It's a terrifying invasion of privacy.

Luckily this was the first time and totally just a fluke... wait: https://money.cnn.com/2017/10/11/technology/google-home-mini...

Totally "accidentally".

Shouldn't accidentally be in quotes? Every time google is busted doing nasty things with users privacy they use "accidentally"

yeah,

this stuff i don't understand

People keeping giving Facebook and Google the benefit of the doubt

AT what point are people going to realize these are fundamentally dishonest and deceitful companies

PR BS works, and Google and FB has enormous power when it comes to PR BS.

This seems to happen pretty often with some companies. They should be more careful to not make such silly mistakes!

Hahaha all these accidents that happen nowadays! Just a coincidence?

accidentally, yeah right.

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