A woman has taken to social media to reveal how her two Amazon household devices kelp over 3,000 audio recordings of her.
Taking to social media to share her findings, data privacy TikTok star @my.data.not.yours told to her 57,000 followers in a post: "I requested all the data Amazon has on me and here’s what I found."
She clarified that she has two Amazon Echo Dots and one Amazon Echo in her home - adding that she also uses smart bulbs.
Sharing her computer screen, she explains that Amazon sent her a ZIP file containing 21 different folders - named things like 'Shopping', 'Location', 'Devices', and "Alerts'.
However, after checking out the 'Audio and Transcription' folder, the TikTiker was stunned to find a total of 3,534 voice recordings taken in her home by her smart devices.
Check out her eye-opening video below:Describing the discovery as "so scary", the TikToker plays one of the recordings of her asking her device to turn on the light.
In the post, @my.data.not.yours then reveals that Amazon also had all of her phone contacts and her location. She ends the video by saying: "I'm not totally comfortable with everything they have."
Her video has since amassed over 2.6 million views, but people in the comments section were not as surprised by the results as @my.data.not.yours was. In fact, many of the comments were from people saying that this sort of thing is expected from smart devices and that people need to take more care when reading the "terms and conditions" that come with accounts and products:
In a follow-up video, @my.data.not.yours revealed how people can request their data from Amazon relatively easily. All you have to do is sign into your Amazon account and go to their 'Request My Data' page. More information can be found in the TikToker's video below:
Per the New York Post, a spokesperson for Amazon said: "We give customers transparency and control over their Alexa experience.
"Customers can easily review and delete their voice recordings, or choose not to have them saved at all, at any time.
"Customers can import their mobile phone contacts to the Alexa app so they can use features like hands-free calling and messaging; this optional feature, which customers need to set up, can be disabled at any time.
"Finally, you can grant permissions for the Alexa app to use certain data, such as your mobile device’s geolocation, to provide relevant results (e.g., weather, traffic, restaurant recommendations), and you can manage these permissions in the app."
