Your smartphone (Google) is listening to you: experience of Aloe Vera and Dupontel's pétanque
published: 12/10/19, 14:10
I had this experience, quite disturbing, about a year ago. I called him the experience of Aloe Vera and you will understand why.
I take advantage of the interest and worries about facial recognition Company-and-philosophy / France-recognition and facial-in-the-public-services-t16143.html to take the time to let you know.
The interest of this experience is that it can be reproduced by EVERYONE who has an Android / Google smartphone ... as long as it is "modern" enough ...
Here is the context of the experiment:
- It's summer 2018 in the middle of the day
- We are located in France in the North East
- The phone, a Samsung S8 bought in the spring 2018, is placed on the living room table. Today it is under android 9 but the S8 came out with an Android 7 so I do not know which version I was using at that time (7, 8? The 9 was released later ...)
- The 4G network activated and makes a Wifi point for a Playstation 4
I arrive in the living room with a new drink at theAloe vera and I say to my son:
"See I just bought a drink from theAloe vera, do you want to drip? "
We have a drink, I repeat many times Aloe vera... We launch the Youtube application of the PS4. The PS4 was already on in "menu" mode (no application launched).
It is important to mention that I did not NEVER done research on Aloe Vera on this new phone and even less on the PS4 nor on the Google account linked to this phone.
That day, I spoke to my son about Coluche and I wanted to show him "Coluche" videos so ...
So I logically do a search for "Coluche" on youtube PS4 ...
And there in the results, between 2 videos of Coluche, I have a video (not advertising) about Aloe Vera!
It is well known that the themes "Coluche" and "Aloe Vera" are close and that one can be linked to the other.
Too bad I did not have the reflex to take a screenshot ... but I think it was this video:
What can we learn from it?
To begin with, know that I have never configured or activated the "Ok Google" ie android voice search, so it is not possible that this comes from this functionality.
It can be deduced without too much risk that:
- Google / Youtube sniff vocally without your knowledge (but it is not possible to say if it is h24 or only during certain periods ...) because there is a big difference to exploit a voluntary text search and listen to a discussion
- the personalization of results is not only related to the device or internal cookies
- the personalization of the results is also linked to the IP and that it is cross platforms (exchanges between the systems / softwares) ... This can be rather disturbing and counterproductive for the large families, the children being able to obtain advertisements related to the parents' research ... and vice versa!
The last point, I had already noticed in 2017: electricity-electronics-informatics / Remarketing-retargeting-amazon-exchange-your-information-with-facebook-and-google-t15158.html
This experience is easily reproducible by anyone: you just have to speak vocally about a subject that you do not mention often and therefore which is not in your recent search history and see how your phone or the devices there. are connected behave ...
This has been confirmed by several friends on other topics: I suggest you to do this simple experiment by yourself and share the results! Choose a subject that is far or unknown from your usual subjects and observe the behavior of your phone / PS / computer within minutes or hours.
It is possible that it is necessary to insist several times this specific key word to have results and it is necessary that the system is in mode "listening", not on that it is it 24/24 as said above ... I specify well, I don't have facebook on my phone. Facebook confessed to listening or being able to activate the microphone without the user's consent (without that having changed much since !!)
In short, test, analyze, cry on the burial of your private life ...
I had alerted here a few months ago that data was exchanged between the GAFA: electricity-electronics-informatics / Remarketing-retargeting-amazon-exchange-your-information-with-facebook-and-google-t15158.html
Conclusion: Facial recognition is simply an additional and logical step of these technologies that already largely flout our privacy for years ...
Edit addition, Albert Dupontel had the same experience but with pétanque:
ps: I am quite astonished that this subject, important, is not mentioned by yououtuber "superstars" ... oh yes they want to keep their income ...
I take advantage of the interest and worries about facial recognition Company-and-philosophy / France-recognition and facial-in-the-public-services-t16143.html to take the time to let you know.
The interest of this experience is that it can be reproduced by EVERYONE who has an Android / Google smartphone ... as long as it is "modern" enough ...
Here is the context of the experiment:
- It's summer 2018 in the middle of the day
- We are located in France in the North East
- The phone, a Samsung S8 bought in the spring 2018, is placed on the living room table. Today it is under android 9 but the S8 came out with an Android 7 so I do not know which version I was using at that time (7, 8? The 9 was released later ...)
- The 4G network activated and makes a Wifi point for a Playstation 4
I arrive in the living room with a new drink at theAloe vera and I say to my son:
"See I just bought a drink from theAloe vera, do you want to drip? "
We have a drink, I repeat many times Aloe vera... We launch the Youtube application of the PS4. The PS4 was already on in "menu" mode (no application launched).
It is important to mention that I did not NEVER done research on Aloe Vera on this new phone and even less on the PS4 nor on the Google account linked to this phone.
That day, I spoke to my son about Coluche and I wanted to show him "Coluche" videos so ...
So I logically do a search for "Coluche" on youtube PS4 ...
And there in the results, between 2 videos of Coluche, I have a video (not advertising) about Aloe Vera!
It is well known that the themes "Coluche" and "Aloe Vera" are close and that one can be linked to the other.
Too bad I did not have the reflex to take a screenshot ... but I think it was this video:
What can we learn from it?
To begin with, know that I have never configured or activated the "Ok Google" ie android voice search, so it is not possible that this comes from this functionality.
It can be deduced without too much risk that:
- Google / Youtube sniff vocally without your knowledge (but it is not possible to say if it is h24 or only during certain periods ...) because there is a big difference to exploit a voluntary text search and listen to a discussion
- the personalization of results is not only related to the device or internal cookies
- the personalization of the results is also linked to the IP and that it is cross platforms (exchanges between the systems / softwares) ... This can be rather disturbing and counterproductive for the large families, the children being able to obtain advertisements related to the parents' research ... and vice versa!
The last point, I had already noticed in 2017: electricity-electronics-informatics / Remarketing-retargeting-amazon-exchange-your-information-with-facebook-and-google-t15158.html
This experience is easily reproducible by anyone: you just have to speak vocally about a subject that you do not mention often and therefore which is not in your recent search history and see how your phone or the devices there. are connected behave ...
This has been confirmed by several friends on other topics: I suggest you to do this simple experiment by yourself and share the results! Choose a subject that is far or unknown from your usual subjects and observe the behavior of your phone / PS / computer within minutes or hours.
It is possible that it is necessary to insist several times this specific key word to have results and it is necessary that the system is in mode "listening", not on that it is it 24/24 as said above ... I specify well, I don't have facebook on my phone. Facebook confessed to listening or being able to activate the microphone without the user's consent (without that having changed much since !!)
In short, test, analyze, cry on the burial of your private life ...
I had alerted here a few months ago that data was exchanged between the GAFA: electricity-electronics-informatics / Remarketing-retargeting-amazon-exchange-your-information-with-facebook-and-google-t15158.html
Conclusion: Facial recognition is simply an additional and logical step of these technologies that already largely flout our privacy for years ...
Edit addition, Albert Dupontel had the same experience but with pétanque:
ps: I am quite astonished that this subject, important, is not mentioned by yououtuber "superstars" ... oh yes they want to keep their income ...