Technology

Besides the fact that present-day battery technology makes this impossible, modern smartphones display a very obvious indicator when apps are using the microphone.

Hotword detection notwithstanding, as that happens at the hardware level.

I'm not saying this information is wrong (I've previously shared 404 Media's reporting on this as well) but as far as I know the only source for this claim is still from CMG itself. No one has independently verified that CMG is actually capable of doing this, nor has any source come forward to confirm that "yes, this is real and my company uses it". I believe the closest we've had to that is a single company confirming that CMG made these same claims to them in a sales pitch. Basically, the entire story is based on marketing material that could also be complete bullshit. The tech industry is infested with grifters who will say anything to get ahead and this could just be another case of that. I understand that many people do not understand how data collection works and have been convinced for years that "the only way they could have known that is if they were listening to me" but 404 Media's reporting on this is not definitive proof that this technology actually exists and is seeing widespread use.

Both links are paywalled, but if I’m remembering correctly, that company (CMG) eventually had to correct their claim that phones were actively listening to everything you say. It was an overzealous marketing guy trying to oversell. They admitted in the end that they use the same info that data brokers have on you based on data gathered from your browsing and other activity, not from actively listening to you.

Siri for example is designed in a way where it “listens” for your voice to call it, but that mechanism is completely separate from the actual Siri that connects to the internet to understand you.

with shockingly high accuracy, and thus aim products at you.

I'm still waiting for a single targeted add to be something I want, the best they've done so far is try and sell me things I already own.

There’s a lotta Apple hate on this site, but I really do appreciate their stance to apps using the camera and microphone.

I think it depends on the individual. The ones I get are definitely crappy (and occasionally hilarious, like the time it was trying to sell me a copy of Latin for Gardeners.)

And then what they found was that to be more effective was to mix up the suggestions for late term pregnancy / early childhood products with basically random nonsense...

... because if its too obvious that they are highly statistically confident that they know things about you that they shouldn't, people get weirded out and are less likely to buy something so specifically targeted at them.

They know an insane amount, and they do not want you to know that they know that much.

The other things were like a large purse/tote bag and a rug, so yeah it was kinda random (so it seems) but apparently the evidence is pretty solid in that case.

Doesn’t make it any less weird though.

IIRC, she miscarried and sued for the emotional distress of continued ads which followed the expected development of her (tragically lost) baby.

Are we sure we can call that targeted pharmaceutical advertisement? It sounds like it could just be the algorithm accidentally discovering a correlation between expecting mothers and preference for unscented hand creams and such.

Unless Amazon did specifically program that in, I think these accidental correlation is not something you can control before it happens and trying to regulate them would be a waste of time and resources.

But how do you know if a prescription is right for you if you can't ask your doctor today! /s

The republicans would love this technology but they're to busy trying to figure out how to turn on their TV. What's the wire thing in the back of it supposed to do? What about the little black brick with letters on it? It doesn't even say anything useful like WTF is 123? 456? 789? I get it seven ate nine! It gets this one, its funny 🤣! Anyway it will take some time before the republicans could make use of tech like that.... unless evil people help them.

"you're going to die. but first, renew your prime subscription."

Lucky you then that Amazon now has their own pharmacy!

Wow you solved every data privacy problem. Just don't be a consumer, why didn't I think of that? It's not the companies that are the problem, it's our fault!

And more than willing to pay for the privelege.

Because with corporations you theoretically are able to opt out.

To be fair though, that's pretty much any pharmacy system. I just switched my main pharmacy over last year, and it's basically the same process.

It's legal in US but not in most other countries

Temu drugs would ship in a Ziploc sandwich bag with the name of the drug misspelled in black sharpie on a piece of tan masking tape stuck to it.