Each question was designed to test an aspect of how the voice assistants work. You can see some of the scripted questions we gave the volunteers to ask Alexa and Google Assistant in the graphics. Polk Audio Assist, £179 (Google Assistant).LG WK7 ThinQ Smart Speaker, £139 (Google Assistant).Google Home Max, £299 (Google Assistant).Amazon Echo Plus (2nd Gen), £139 (Alexa).
We then asked them to find out what information was stored about them, including contacting Amazon and Google with a ‘subject access request’ (SAR), which is one of your rights under data protection law to find out what personal data companies hold about you.Įach volunteer used one of the following smart speakers or smart displays: After that, they could use the devices more naturally, however they liked. We gave six volunteers an Alexa or Google Assistant smart speaker to take home, and some scripted questions to ask. We spoke to Dr Hamed Haddadi at Imperial College London to get his take on voice assistants. Read on to see what our investigation uncovered, or find out how to set up a smart home. We wanted to see what’s actually being recorded, how the recordings are being used, and how easy it is to control your privacy. We put both leading voice assistants, and the companies behind them, to the test. The thought of what these companies could know out about you by listening in is, naturally, a scary one. But now smart speakers can listen to the everyday conversations in the heart of our homes – giving the potential for companies to take targeted advertising to a whole new level. Targeted advertising widely takes place as a result of the things we search for online. Many people worry that voice assistants are used for surveillance, while another major concern is that Amazon and Google will use their voice assistants for marketing purposes. But do they have a dark side? We dug deeper to find out. At least one in five homes in the UK now contains a smart speaker, according to a government report.
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