Is Your Phone Listening to You? | NOVA | PBS 

It’s legal for the NSA to continually gather phone data on all citizens via Special Source Operations. And it’s legal for social media apps to listen in: we consent to it when we agree upon downloading their apps.

😮

​@@aircreedYou automatically consent to Google eavesdropping when you create an account or even use Android without an account.

Evil people!

this has happened with my friends & i also so, although i'm sure the algorithm does do some predicting, there are situations where listening is the only thing that makes sense.

I've heard that because phones are pinging towers constantly, when you are in proximity to other people for extended periods of time, they associate their data and preferences with yours... Like you're probably friends so you probably like similar things

Access is just that, access to the internet. The WWW is part of the internet, one that’s commercial and everything seeks to turn a profit.

​@@timan2039 the WWW runs on the Internet, technically. the network or inter-network of computers and servers communicating to each other-that's the Internet. For example, my home PC and laptop "talking" to Verizon or AT&T servers. That's a slice of the Internet.

Capitalism

I know for a fact that FB uses my phone and listen to what I say. I often be silly towards my wife, and I have joked to her verbally ONLY, saying " Can I suckle? " and now on FB, BREASTFEEDING clips show up. It took about 3-4 clips before I realized my joke of suckle turned into my phone heard what I said. AND 'NO', I NEVER LOOKED UP BREAST FEEDING OR suckle.

Absolutely...these goofballs are paid to say this...

Phones are listening 100%

One time I was playing online games and somebody had faked their own death and we were talking about it in a group chat, and to my family. Later that day in my Google News feed was the headline why people sometimes fake their own death LOL😂 Definitely listening lots and happens often

Exactly!!!!

Had a convo with a friend on our back porch about breathing exercises to improve cardiovascular health. Phones in pockets. 5 minutes later, RU-vid algorithm suggests videos on…breathing exercises to improve cardiovascular health. And this happens literally every day. The “horse” is definitely leading the “cart,” but I’m not driving. I leave my phone at home now, like I did for the first 40 years of my life.

And if they get caught what would be the consequence? Nothing.

If your phone is not listening, how does it hear its wake-up word?

You examine the network traffic - the same way your ISP does when you’re not using a VPN, and the same way your VPN provider does when you are using a VPN.

@@babybirdhome You might initially pay someone to try to do that, and then the multibillion dollar corporation simply draws out the legal proceedings to the point where they exhaust the resources of the plaintiff.

Easy to prove

As do I. However, and here’s the rub, the global advertising monolith makes every effort not to ignore you and me.

They know you better than you.

Literally everyone. That's why it exists.

​@dukeallen432 Nah, they suck at guessing me. Seriously. Maybe because I often lie. I recommend it.

Exactly

And what do you think prompted you to think about cat food?

Once you bought the cat food, what kind of cat did you get?

If your phone is not listening, how does it hear its wake-up word?

@@amicaaranearumIt only listens for the wakeup word, and once it hears that, THEN it sends what it hears next to the internet for it to respond to you.

I'm pretty sure they get around the listening thing by turning your voice into text being sent rather then your voice. That way they can say they're not "listening."

Just be sure to keep looking at the phone in the hour before you fall asleep.

Oh lordy don't give them ideas 😅 Actually they've likely already considered it...👻

100% This right here.

Do you happen to remember the article or news organization you found that out from? Would love to read up on this

They Live

@@RealMTBAddict Literally all 80s dystopian movies were warnings, instead were used as a handbook to turn humanity into slaves like Hitler would have done.

😂 Clearly someone commented without watching the video!

saying "nuh-uh, that would be a crime! probably you're just a big rube" is not in any sense a debunking.

@@akhrageeThe debunking is the fact that there are literally tens of millions of cybersecurity professionals all over the world, and not one of them is saying your phone is listening to you all the time. Here are several ways to prove it. 1. Examine your network traffic. Nobody can listen in on your conversations without actually having your conversations to listen in on - that requires them to send it over the network, and you can easily inspect everything coming from or going to your device over the network. 2. With tens of millions of cybersecurity experts all over the world, none of them are out there telling you your phones are listening to you all the time. In fact, outside of a handful of very limited cases, they’re all telling you that your phone is not listening to you. 3. Charge your phone up to 100%, then call someone on it and talk to them until it dies. Measure how long that takes. Next, charge your phone up to 100% again and this time, just set it down on the counter all day and don’t touch it and don’t use it for anything. Does your battery last longer or not? If it lasts longer, it’s because it’s not transmitting everything you’re saying all the time because it’s not listening in on your conversations all the time. 4. Look at how much data you use in a month. Don’t use your phone for anything for a month and check it again. Is your data usage way down? That’s because your phone isn’t listening to everything you say and sending it to data brokers over the internet. If it were, you’d see it on your phone bill in data usage every month. 5. Try your experiment again, but this time put your phones in the microwave first (don’t turn the microwave on!). Your microwave blocks your phone’s signals because your phone uses the same frequencies as microwaves use. This will prevent it from being able to talk to the cellular network or local wifi networks or bluetooth networks. You’ll still see the same results with ads as you saw before. That’s because you’re talking about things you’ve already been primed to talk about before hand. The data brokers already know this - they’re the ones who primed you in the first place. There are numerous other simple ways to prove it’s not listening to you, but these will get you started.

The video did not debunk the phone listening. It brushed it off as illegal and pointed to another technique used as the excuse. The reason this holds no water is that it doesnt explain why ads are shown when two people decide to speak about a random topic to intentionally make the ads show up on their devices. It's too far a stretch to attribute that to advertisers putting it in the peoples heads ahead of time.

correlation is not causation

@@partdeux992 random coincidence, what are the odds.

@@notbanksy8294 i'm kidding. u r right :) they probably process info w AI by now

@@Joe-sg9ll probably dem aliens again, yep.

I just posted this as a reply to another post, but this is a good example as well. My guess is that your neighbor looked up the video you were talking about. Here's what I posted earlier: When I reply to you RU-vid knows that we had a conversation and links us. It will recommend some of the channels that you've liked based on what other people I've interacted with have also liked. As for phones, it knows who you're near (ie, via bluetooth or the new "find my device" network) and makes similar associations. If you ever bring your phone to another person's house and it sees you on their network, it will bring your content recommendations onto their smart tvs. I watch a small streamer that does "reaction" videos. When the video reaction ends and RU-vid pulls up new videos to watch, I have seen recommendations there that I also see in my own account. That's not to say the phone ISN'T listening (it is), but as the video suggests, what's really happening is far more interesting.

This is why I've always hated automated services being forced on us. From traffic control too online shopping, banking etc.

Propaganda

If you have a cam or mic connected to the internet, somebody is always recording.

"They" may also have access to your purchase records and geolocation accurate to within yards. Doing much more than just listening

I am sure they keep track of every paid item with my CC.

unplug from everything

This.