If you’re interested in digital privacy but not a techie, this WaPo article may be of interest to you. I liked this bit on ultimate goals:
There’s more: Amazon also keeps reports on appliances you connect to Alexa — in my smart home, every flip of a light switch or adjustment on the thermostat. Last week, Amazon reported that Alexa users received “millions” of doorbell and motion announcements during the 2019 holiday season, “from carolers to delivery drivers and holiday guests.” Surveilling that many homes is a thing the company brags about. (Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post, but I review all technology with the same critical eye.)
Amazon isn’t building its dossier on you just to be creepy. It wants your voice and your data to train its AI, the technology it hopes will rule our future economy.
“And I, for one, welcome our new Artificially Intelligent Overlords!”
Maybe my reader is copacetic with that, but I’m not. Especially given the inscrutability of AI decisions.
And I am planning to check up on the author’s recommended privacy service, Jumbo. It’d be a pity if it’s just a dodge for one more company to get its claws into my data, but it looks useful if it’s on the up and up.
