Rumors have been circulating for several years: our smartphone would listen to the slightest of our conversations to extract keywords and, ultimately, display targeted advertisements. It would not be, according to journalists from the Daily Mail. They wanted to clarify this matter with the help of a simple, but effective little experiment.
It’s no secret that our smartphones are veritable goldmines for brands. Indeed, our applications constantly collect mountains of data, which are then analyzed to determine which ads will be most effective. You read an article about the most beautiful places to visit in Italy, Google will offer you plane tickets at an unbeatable price.
Also, rumor has it that our smartphones even listen to us in secret, scrutinizing all our conversations verbally in search of information of interest to advertisers. Really ? Our colleagues from the Daily Mail wanted to get to the bottom of it. And their conclusion is clear: not only we are not listeningbut the practice would also have no interest for manufacturers.
Related: Google Denies Spying Charges Via Google Assistant, No Data is Stored
Smartphones spy on everything we do, but not our conversations
To get there, the journalists got hold of a new Samsung smartphone, on which they configured a new Google account. They also created a blank Facebook account. Following which, the latter regularly spoke of “at risk” subjects next to the smartphone, such as holidays in Europe or floor renovation products.
After several days, no advertising related to these conversations has been generated. According to cybersecurity expert Jordan Shroeder, the reason is simple: Google, Apple and other manufacturers have no interest in listening to their users, since they already collect a lot of data through other means. The operation would simply cost too expensive for an outdated result.
But that only applies to smartphones. For voice assistants, it’s a different story: “Yes, Google, Apple, and Amazon are always listening to you if you’ve enabled the virtual assistant to listen for ‘keywords’,” says Jordan Shroeder. “Sound samples are regularly sent to their servers to be analyzed in order to improve their algorithms. »
Source : DailyMail
