Smart speakers remain at the center of all criticism for the doubts that they generate about the privacy of their usersAnd none of the tech giants are free of those doubts, not even Apple. A few weeks ago the controversy jumped for something that it did not hide, but that it did not publish clearly either: Apple listened to the conversations of its users to improve Siri.
A Siri improvement program in which companies subcontracted by Apple listened to what we said to their assistant, yes, anonymously, but which raised many doubts in a company that constantly presumes to respect the privacy of its users to the maximum. As a result of these criticisms, the listening program was suspended, and today Apple has already announced the changes that you are going to apply to it.
The controversy: Apple listened to you
It is inevitable: if you want a virtual assistant to improve, you have to listen to what is asked of him to be able to know if it has been understood correctly and if the answer that has been given is the correct one. This procedure is done by all the big companies, including Apple. This is made very clear in his documents on privacy, he has not hidden it at any time, but he did not have it too accessible to the public either. To this must be added another major failure (in my opinion) which was that those people who were listening were not Apple employees, but of companies hired for it.
According to the company, only 0,2% of all requests made to Siri were sent, a very low percentage but taking into account that there will be millions of requests per day, the absolute number was very high. All these conversations were anonymous, the one who listened to them at no time could know the identity, or the iCloud account, location, etc. user. Neither the low percentage nor the anonymity of the users served to calm the criticism and they had no choice but to suspend the program and therefore listen to them.
The solution: you decide if he listens to you or not
The company has responded quickly, how could it be otherwise. At a time when privacy is so questionable, the company that boasts the utmost respect for this rare commodity cannot afford these errors, and after suspending the Siri evaluation program (and listening to them) has announced that will resume shortly that program with important changes to respect the privacy of users as much as possible.
The fundamental change is that, By default, no user's conversations with Siri will be recorded. Computer-generated automatic transcripts will continue to be made to improve the assistant, but without recording conversations or being heard by anyone. Only those users who so wish will be able to participate in the Siri enhancement program allowing their requests to be recorded and listened to. Of course, anonymity is guaranteed by strict controls.
Those recordings that are obtained from users who voluntarily allow it will be heard only by Apple employees, there will be no companies outside the company. In the event that Siri has been activated in the wrong way, that recording will be deleted immediately. In addition, users who agree to participate in this Siri enhancement program will be able to withdraw from it at any time they wish to do so. These changes will arrive in the fall, following the relevant software updates.
