How Secure is the Echo Dot?

We got an Amazon Echo Dot for Christmas this year, which is a smaller version of the Echo. What a great gift!  It was fairly easy to set up and the very next morning we woke up to asking Alexa for the time, flash news, and some relaxing Christmas music. She even followed the news up with our local weather. Sweet!

Other possible uses that might come in handy are connecting it to your bank account to hear your balance, ordering your dogs favorite treats on Amazon.com, getting traffic alerts for your commute, and connecting to smart devices in your home to control your lights or thermostat.

But how secure is the Echo Dot? It does record and save all of your voice data , listening to you even when you aren’t talking directly to it. The data is sent to Amazon’s cloud servers, processed, and followed up by an answer or action. Using artificial intelligence, over time your voice and requests are analyzed, which helps Alexa to anticipate your wants and needs.

It’s a pretty amazing digital assistant for everyday tasks. However, there are some security risks that can arise with all of that stored data, as mentioned in the followed post by Gizmodo.com:

Amazon’s Alexa Is Not Even Remotely Secure and I Really Don’t Care

Alexa is burrowing itself deeper and deeper into owners’ lives, giving them quick and easy access not just to Spotify and the Amazon store, but to bank

Image from Wikimedia Commons

accounts and to do lists. And that expanded usability also means expanded vulnerability.

Devices that currently use Alexa—the Amazon Echo and Amazon Fire TV—can’t tell the difference between voices. Which means anyone who has access to your home has access to every single account you’ve linked to Alexa. Kids can reorder their favorite candy, friends can inquire about your bank balance, and roommates can waste your money on a lark.

Those risks are the cost of embracing the Internet of Things. In the pursuit of convenience we have to sacrifice privacy…and hope guests aren’t tacky enough to ask our live-in robot about our bank balance.

Read the full post here:  Amazon’s Alexa Is Not Even Remotely Secure and I Really Don’t Care

I guess this Twitter post pretty much says it all:

Echo Dot is a hands-free,
voice-controlled device that uses Alexa. #amazonecho. https://t.co/YOV1lnOAgK pic.twitter.com/Y94PSLbzy5

— marketer (@myworkathomebiz) December 27, 2016

Apparently the Echo and Echo Dot were sold out well before Christmas and won’t be available until after the holiday season. The cost of an Echo is around $180, but the Echo Dot is only $50, making it a very popular affordable gift this year.

This post tells when each product will be back in stock:

Amazon Echo Sold Out: Where You Can Still Buy Echo Dot And When They’ll Be Back In Stock

Amazon Echo in black, priced at $139.99 will be in stock on Jan. 19, 2017.

The second generation Echo Dot in black, which costs $39.99, will be in stock just after Christmas on Dec. 27.

The Amazon Echo in white, also for $139.99, will be in stock on Dec. 30, the site says.

And, Alexa-enabled portable speaker, Amazon Tap, will be in stock on Dec. 27. That device is priced at $89.99.

Read more here:  Amazon Echo Sold Out: Where You Can Still Buy Echo Dot And When They’ll Be Back In Stock

This video is a review of the Amazon Echo Dot from the perspective of a young man. He received one for Christmas and does a fairly professional review of the uses for this personal assistant. Judging from his reaction when he asked Alexa for music, I guess either she hasn’t learned his preferences, or maybe it’s just that kids his age don’t like Christmas music:

If it makes you nervous that your voice commands are being recorded and analyzed, there are options. You don’t have to smash it with a hammer or throw it in a river. CNET provides the instructions on how to delete individual requests as well as how to delete the whole shebang:

Amazon Echo saves all your voice data. Here’s how to delete it – CNET

To delete specific recordings, go to the Amazon Echo app > Settings > History. You’ll see a list of all the requests you’ve made since setting up your Echo.

From Wikimedia Commons

To delete a recording, tap it, then tap Delete voice recordings.

For those who don’t take chances, there’s a way to delete all voice data in one fell swoop. Head to www.amazon.com/myx, sign in, and click Your Devices. Select Amazon Echo, then click Manage Voice Recordings.

Read the original post here:  Amazon Echo saves all your voice data. Here’s how to delete it – CNET

We did see that people were selling Amazon Dot on Ebay for a significant markup. I guess if you wanted it bad enough, you could have gotten it for approximately three times the purchase price. If you can wait a short amount of time, though, you will be able to get it for the original cost.

See the original post here:  S&S Pro Blog

 

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Google’s Newest Virtual Assistant Will Rival the Amazon Echo

As active, hard-working business owners, we are both focused on our company as well as trying to maximize the quality time we are able to spend together, with friends and family. With all the tech advances being developed at lightning speed, using products that assist in finding this balance is critical. One such product is a high quality speaker that can play your favorite music but more importantly, it can talk to you and help you with daily tasks without having to even touch your PC or mobile device.

The Amazon Echo is an example of this type of technology. However, word is out that Google’s newest virtual assistant could cause a shift in the ongoing power struggle between these two tech giants. To activate the VA (virtual assistant), you only have say “her” name, Alexa.  If desired, this “wake word” can be changed to Amazon or Echo.

So, what can Alexa and Amazon Echo do?

*Reads books, news, weather, sports reports…whatever you choose.
*Answers questions that we used to stop and Google on a device.
*Plays music from several sources on a great sound system.
*Dial whatever number you need to call.
*Control compatible lights, switches, and thermostats

Amazon is constantly adding new skills and features to Alexa’s repertoire, which is receiving very good reviews. Sounds pretty amazing, huh? Well, here comes Google’s rival to the Echo – Google Home.

The Home assistant was recently announced at Google’s annual conference for developers. It’s something they’ve been working on for quite some time now, with other ventures such as the thermostat controlling Google Nest being combined into a larger, more all-encompassing device.

Google Home can do pretty much everything the Amazon Echo can do. In addition, it synchronizes with any Google Cast device, allowing you to group it with your other speakers and use voice commands to stream movies and video to your TV with the Chromecast device. It also has a little bit more of a contemporary look compared to the Echo, but both are extremely functional time savers.

Here’s what Engadget.com has to say about the Google Home:

Like the Echo, Google Home is also a speaker that can keep music and entertainment streaming directly from the cloud to insure top-notch quality. As you’d expect, it offers Google Cast support, so you can group it with your other speakers for multi-room audio or start playing videos on your television with Chromecast. And yes, both of those are voice-controlled tasks. You can even tell Home to play music on another piece of audio gear in another room, as opposed to the whole group or just Home itself.

In addition, Google Home will serve as your Internet of Things hub, linking all of your connected devices like lights, cameras, thermostats and small appliances. You can also swap out the base to better match your decor, but the LEDs that provide a visual status update will remain on the bottom of the speaker. Home gives you access to Google Assistant as well, allowing you to ask follow-up questions until you get the answers you’re after. It will also browse your schedule to give you an idea of what your day looks like as you’re heading out the door.

Read the full article here:  

This video from TheVerge.com demonstrates the Google Home device by giving the features of the new product. 

So, the battle is once again on between Google and Amazon to see who can win the sales war of in-home virtual assistants. Both companies have massive amounts of resources to keep pushing each other into the ring of competition. Many say that Google’s Home can’t possibly win the fight since Amazon has such a head start and pretty much controls the product search market, but it will be a fun fight to watch.

Originally Posted on S&S Pro Blog