Amazon’s Alexa recorded while she was sleeping, customer said. What happened?

“Hey, Alexa.”

It’s a command that’s probably said millions of times a day as consumers ask questions of Amazon’s artificial intelligence voice. Amazon recently said it has sold more than 500 million Alexa-enabled devices.

Using these devices, people ask Alexa to find phone numbers for them, play a song or turn out the lights. They can control thermostats and robotic vacuums, and even unlock a door.

But sometimes, Alexa doesn’t work as expected.

Kate Creegan, who lives in Far Hills with her husband Mike and their Havanese pup named Penny, said they have Alexa-enabled devices all over the house and they’ve used the service since 2016.

“We use them all day long for questions, weather, music and spelling,” she said.

But in February, they had an Alexa incident and they weren’t sure what to make of it.

Amazon’s customer service wasn’t helpful, and even gave Creegan cause to worry, she said.

“(The representative) said it was not an Amazon issue and I was told to change the password and/or change the service provider and/or call the police,” she said. “It’s very weird and creepy.”

Concerned about the possibility of scams or a future filled with unsavory episodes, she asked if Bamboozled could get to the bottom of it.

How it went down

Creegan said among her devices is an Echo Dot – a voice-controlled smart speaker – in her bedroom. It works with two smart light bulbs, one on each night table.

“When I go to bed, I ask Alexa to turn my light off by saying ‘Alexa, Kate’s or bedroom light off’,” Creegan said. “Then I say, ‘Alexa, Mike’s light 10%’, and it dims so I can go to sleep and he can get to the bed with a dim light on.”

The night of Feb 15, while Creegan was sleeping, there was a missed call and a message recorded on her cellphone.

When she got around to looking at the message, she saw it was 67 minutes long.

She said some of it was gibberish, but she was able to make out her voice asking Alexa to fix the lights. It also had her husband apparently speaking to Penny, saying that someone’s face was cold and that they liked her vodka sauce – the meal Creegan cooked for dinner that night.

But what she didn’t understand was why the whole conversation was recorded, and how, and who made the call that started the whole recording to begin with.

Calling it “disturbing”, she wanted to figure out what happened.

You see, devices that use Alexa do record conversations, but not every one of them and not all the time, Amazon said.

It will only turn on, or “wake”, when you use the “wake word”, which by default is the word Alexa.

“Only after your Echo device detects the wake word is Alexa listening to your requests,” Amazon said, noting that a light indicator comes on the unit so people can see it’s recording.

Creegan said reached a customer service representative in a chat. This was the person who said Creegan should change her passwords, phone provider and notify police, she said.

The explanation

Some consumers are turned off by the idea that an Alexa device could be listening to their conversations, or even somehow be used nefariously to snoop or steal private information.

The Better Business Bureau warns consumers not to use smart devices to look for a phone number because scammers can create imposter accounts with fake customer service numbers. When those show up in search results, consumers could end up calling and giving personal information to a crook.

Amazon even filed a lawsuit against a company it accused of the practice.

Creegan said she was concerned that a scammer could have somehow activated her device and then recorded her conversation, hoping to get enough breadcrumbs to somehow steal her personal information.

We shared the Alexa transcript and Creegan’s description of events with Amazon, which said it would investigate.

A short while later, Creegan received a phone call.

The Amazon representative apologised and said there would be more training for the customer service folks who responded to her initial inquiries, Creegan said.

He also explained what happened. He said the device “woke up” to a word sounding like “Alexa”.

“Subsequent conversation was interpreted as a request to ‘call my phone’, which initiated the Find My Phone feature,” he said, explaining the Find My Phone feature allows people to use their Echo devices to ask Alexa to help them find their phone by placing a call to their cellphone.

“The Alexa request made to your Echo Dot initiated this feature, and resulted in your Echo Dot calling your cellphone,” he said. “When the call wasn’t answered on your mobile phone, it was sent to voicemail and recorded the message you heard.”

Amazon stressed that the devices don’t record or store conversations unless the wake word is detected, and the indicator light would always be on when it is listening.

It also said it encourages customers to learn how to identify scams, including payment scams, and to report scam concerns on its website.

Creegan said the representative also told her she could hit the “mute” button, which would stop the device from recording until she reactivated it. She could mute the device every night when she goes to sleep to prevent it from occurring again, she said she was told.

“(The representative) also said they wanted to compensate me because I did not get a clear response in the beginning. I insisted I did not want or need compensation,” Creegan said, but the representative insisted and applied a US$50 (RM234) credit to her account, she said.

Creegan said she’s happy to know she doesn’t have to worry about the mishap.

“All I wanted was a clear explanation and if there was a way to prevent it happening, and I feel so good and relieved to have received that,” she said. – nj.com/Tribune News Service