Hey, Alexa, What Can You Hear? And What Will You Do With It?<br />His new movie is playing in a theater near you.’”<br />In a statement, Amazon said the company took “privacy seriously” and did “not use customers’ voice recordings for targeted advertising.” Amazon said<br />that it filed “a number of forward-looking patent applications that explore the full possibilities of new technology,” and that they “take multiple years to receive and do not necessarily reflect current developments to products and services.”<br />Google said it did not “use raw audio to extrapolate moods, medical conditions or demographic information.” The company added, “All devices<br />that come with the Google Assistant, including Google Home, are designed with user privacy in mind.”<br />Tech companies apply for a dizzying number of patents every year, many of which are never used and are years from even being possible.<br />Still, Jamie Court, the president of Consumer Watchdog, a nonprofit advocacy group in Santa Monica, Calif., which published a study of some of the patent applications in December, said, “When you read parts of the applications, it’s really clear<br />that this is spyware and a surveillance system meant to serve you up to advertisers.”<br />The companies, Mr. Court added, are “basically going to be finding out what our home life is like in qualitative ways.”<br />Google called Consumer Watchdog’s claims “unfounded,”<br />and said, “Prospective product announcements should not necessarily be inferred from our patent applications.”<br />A recent Gallup poll found that 22 percent of Americans used devices like Google Home or Amazon Echo.
