Not my title! I do think we are being listened to. And location tracked. And it’s being passed on to advertisers. Is it apple though? Probably not is my take away from this article, but I don’t trust plenty of others, and apple still does
The worse part is, they don’t really need to bug your mic to figure out what you are talking about to target ads to you. The best sales leads are the family and friends of your existing customers. So say you talk to you coworker about how they switched to this new diaper rash cream for their baby. You might not have a baby but you talked about it and somehow you got ads for diaper rash cream. What really happened though is that your coworker bought their cream on Amazon and that brand purchased target ads for everyone whose location data was nearby them. Or they bought it for everyone whose phone was connected to the same IP address. We have so much data tracked about us that they can guess what we are talking about without actually having to tap our phone lines
I’ve literally seen advertisements for products that I was talking about but explicitly did not search for or type or anything on any device. All I did was talk about it in real life.
It’s literally a thing that happens, I have seen it happen first-hand.
Apps listening to your mic to give you targeted ads is an urban legend. There’s tools to see which apps listen to you and there isn’t any evidence that any of the popular stuff ever open the microphone (unless you’re in a call or something). If you’re too worried about it, you can always turn off the mic permission for the app.
The ads are actually coming from other ways of tracking you like browser fingerprinting to follow what things you browse and build a profile on what you like/are interested in.
See also EFF’s article on it: https://www.digitalrightsbytes.org/topics/is-my-phone-listening-to-me
agreed. online tracking is so good it just seems like they’re listening to you.
The ones serving up the ads aren’t even the ones listening. They’re buying collated data from many different sources, then their algorithm matches your interests with one of the products they’re contracted to sell. Next thing you know you’re looking at a Rolex ad because you zoomed in on someone’s watch on their Instagram post.
Jfc, finally some sanity in this thread. Thank you. You’d think a bunch of supposed computer nerds would have done a fucking experiment before going off on some anecdotal bullshit.
In September, I was using reddit, had an iPhone, etc. I was generally aware of digital privacy, probably moreso than the average person, but by no means was I knowledgeable.
I was running a beta on my iPhone at the time, for context. I had a short conversation with my roommate while my phone was in my pocket. I took it out to text my partner and pressed the dictation button. My phone proceeded to type out the majority of the conversation I had had maybe five minutes earlier with my roommate. Literally ruined my ignorance is bliss and now I have a Pixel with grapheneos and use almost exclusively open source software with a major focus on privacy. Obviously this is an anecdote from some idiot online and I can’t verify what I’m saying at all, but the experience definitely shook me.
I once worked in a charity providing mental health services to people without insurance, or who wanted to not have their insurance record the service for whatever reasons.
I once had a homeless man that I would see regularly. We set up each appointment at the end of the preceding appointment, because the only other way to get a hold of this person would be to call the fast food place he worked at, during his work hours, which weren’t consistent. This man did not own a phone, or any other electronic device. His facebook, and all of his online activity was done at his local library. I emphasize this because I need it to be stressed that there was no way any algorithm could connect his location to mine. There was no way for a system to recognize that his device was near mine, because he did not have a device. There was no way for any of his online habits to be algorithmically connected to mine, at all.
One session, we’re speaking. The only devices in our small, sound proofed room, were my cell phone, a digital clock not connected to any system, and a digital camera, turned off, and also not connected to any system. He mentions that he’s been contacted by someone who wants him to move to the Phillipines. We briefly discuss flights and work in the Phillipines. Then we move on to other things, yadda yadda, end session.
By the end of the day, I’m getting ads on Facebook for flights to the Phillipines. Freaked me the fuck out because those sessions are HIPAA protected. From then on I kept my phone turned off, and in a completely different room in our building than any of my sessions with any patient. Never ever had it happen again.
Great story.
Even if anecdotal fuck all of that better safe than sorry.
My dad use to say that Facebook listened to him back in the 2010s. We blew him off as conspiracy nut.
He would say diamond ring diamond ring diamond ring and then all his ads would change next day. We blew him off as conspriatorial and now the algorithm is common knowledge.
Who knows. Scary.
What made you bring up the Philippines in the first place? Even if you have not been served ads before then, or the other guy. Someone either of you have interacted with could’ve done who brought up the Philippines to you or them.
And because there’s an ongoing campaign in your area, eventually you’ll get one of them ads too.
As I said in the original post, the client was contacted by someone over social media about moving to the Phillipines for work. It turned out to be a scam. Nobody else I interacted with made any mention of the Phillipines to me.
Yeah but that scam may have been going around the area elsewhere and had caused a spike of searches in your area so the add companies programmatically fill in what they see as an area with potential leads with ads.
Except it is also listening. This was a minor scandal back in September. I believe Cox media has since been dropped by Facebook and Google and such, but it happened.
What’s Happening: In a pitch deck that has surfaced since the initial story broke out, Cox Media Group (CMG), a digital marketing outfit based out of Atlanta, Georgia, was spotted touting “the power of voice” in a pitch. In it, they outlined how they can use AI to collect and analyze voice data from users through more than 470 sources.
https://news.itsfoss.com/ad-company-listening-to-microphone/
That article covers a pitch deck by an ad agency with absolutely zero detail of how it works.
If this is happening, it should be easy to test.
According to the company, CMG Local Solutions’ access to advertising data based on voice and other data is collected by third-party platforms and devices “under the terms and conditions provided by those apps and accepted by their users.”
In the since-deleted blog post, CMG Local Solutions discusses whether Active Listening is legal. “We know what you’re thinking. Is this even legal? The short answer is: yes. It is legal for phones and devices to listen to you. When a new app download or update prompts consumers with a multi-page terms of use agreement somewhere in the fine print, Active Listening is often included,” the company said in the post.
Apps still need mic permissions to do so. Many Android ROMs include notices when the mic is being used, it would be very easy to tell if an app was actually doing this.
deleted by creator
This is a great case of confirmation bias, too. The one time your ad happens to match a conversation you had earlier, you’ll be convinced forever, and tell everyone you know about it. The ten million other times you have a conversation that doesn’t appear in your ads will go unnoticed.
One of my weirder hobbies is trying to convince people that the idea that companies are listening to you through your phone’s microphone and serving you targeted ads is a conspiracy theory that isn’t true.
ARS said, that reuters said, that users said.
Someone needs a new hobby. “Proof” from 3 layers of journalists interpreting a case that they themself said never went to court. Trying to use evidence of absence as proof will never win any hearts in a debate.
I didn’t seriously believe it happened either for quite some time because confirmation bias is a bitch. But I’ve seen it happen a few times where it would have to be a seriously unlikely coincidence.
If it was searched for in Google, Facebook, apple, or whatever sure
If it was correlated with locality and time, sure.
You can infer a lot from a few searches but there are times where nothing was searched for and a novel concept came out of conversation and book there’s ads and search completion for it.
Maybe, just maybe, someone settling a lawsuit without being found guilty, doesn’t ACTUALLY mean they’re innocent.
Quick experiment. If you don’t own a dog or a cat, talk about buying dog or cat food a couple times today.
about buying dog or cat food a couple times today.
I have both, also, if it’s real, you’d have to match up with an advertiser that really wants your profile.
I search for crap all the time but don’t get ads most of the time, then one time, I look up this one kaz air filter and get nothing but ads for it for a week. hundreds of home depot ads.
“Is it Apple though, probably not…”
Can I ask, why are you so ready to performatively forgive them here? Apple is not your friend, Apple and Tim lined up to donate the million like the rest of those greedy, transactional cowards.
Apple doesn’t “do” it per se, instead Apple shares certain data with third party partners for the purposes of “improving your product experience” the data is then laundered 17 times through middle layers and added to a shared digital fingerprint of you and your household’s web of connected devices. You and your family are then sold on a marketplace as advertising targets actively interested in X category or product (Apple is also subsequently a customer in that marketplace). You then either receive that advertising or your family is targeted with it so that they can then casually mention the product back to you (company knowing you were already interested) so it feels organic and “I was just thinking the same thing!” and boom, you’re buying that new set of pots and pans.
We’re already living in the matrix, you’re just a little drone being pinged around according to other people’s will, to support the pursuit of endless growth. So yes, in a way companies are spying on you… After you’ve given them individual permissions to access your microphone and permission to share “certain data” about you with third parties, in a carefully orchestrated dance - so that they have plausible deniability and so you don’t have to threaten your parasocial relationship with their brand and can continue saying “probably not Apple though…”
I’ll tell you my story, believe it or not.
I had a Samsung phone. got sick and tired of getting not just targeted advertising about shit I had spoken about, buy also targeted emails as well. really freaky shit.
I switched phones. got a fairphone with e/os.
it’s been about 2 years now. my old Samsung is a phone I use strictly for work. it only exists inside my office and is never taken outside of the room.
ALL my ads and emails are about work related topics now.
I could talk about stuffing cheetos up my rectum outside my office and never see an ad for chester cheetah. as soon as I say anything about it in the office, boom!
Sure, Google, or Amazon, or Facebook may not be listening to you…but that doesn’t mean
Samsungsomeone isn’t listening and selling them that information.You are in the same geolocation as other people and they are searching for the stuff you’re talking about. Try whispering to your phone alone in a closet.
I’m not ready for that kind of intimacy.
location data is turned off on my new phone, I also have it spoof my location if it’s ever on.
if what you said were true, then why did my targeted ads completely change to products or services entirely related to my job?
shouldn’t it contain other products that my neighbors are searching for?
Do you connect to company WiFi?
I wfh.
Do you use a VPN for ALL company communications?
only on my laptop. not the phone.
Not surprising. Samsung is one of the companies most openly spying and breaking laws. They’ve also been caught spying on their customers’ tv microphones.
Instagram showed me an ad for a medical condition I only discussed out loud, in person, in my doctors office.
Instagram was immediately uninstalled that day.
Other methods of data collection can be scarily effective. Stores have identified people were pregnant before they knew.
Very likely they identified you as someone that could have that condition, and you noticing the ads after talking to your doctor is a form of recency bias.
You can collect almost all the same data from traditional surveillance methods. Collecting and processing mocrophone data just isn’t effective enough to make up for the massively increased costs from processing it.
As much as I logically know this to be the case, especially now that Android and iOS indicate when things like the mic are active… My brain still wants to reject it because it is just too coincidental.
I do not trust mic switches however, unless someone can provide proof that it physically disconnects the circuit to that microphone, it can be bypassed somewhere and there’s no reason to trust the manufacturer.
It displayed the ad before I could get home and research it. It had only been discussed out loud and in person.
Did you connect to the clinic’s WiFi?
Just being near their WiFi is enough.
Yes, I was on the wifi before the appointment.
I hate to add to the conspiracy, but I know my eye doctor uses a 3rd party which has sections of their hipaa privacy acceptance which allows them to use your info to sell you ads if you don’t decline. Phreesia, is the 3rd party company. Now add the other apps that track your location… time spent there…
and I know my grocery store does the same when you use the discounts. and worse, they have facial recognition so I can’t even opt out (kroger).
Your issue was likely a combo of that.
Can’t be facial-recognized if you always wear an N95 mask in stores ;)
A random person recognized Luigi in just a couple days, and he was wearing a mask in all the video footage released.
Modern recognition systems can scan footage a lot faster than humans. Many modern systems don’t just use facial recognition but other factors like general height, walking gait, stride length, etc. to make more accurate recognitions.
Wasn’t his face revealed in cab footage where he’d taken his mask off within like, a day?
I think there is also probably a difference of scope in what is leveraged when Kroger is trying to get your facial pattern while you’re in the store to track where you go and get more data to sell advertisers vs like, the lengths gone to by the state in order to catch someone who shot a rich person dead in the street.
Your age group, sex, location, profession/industry, income estimation - you can assume they have this data.
That + a few data points that could be tracked by apps or websites:
- Searched online for symptoms
- Searched for doctors
- Called the clinic to schedule an appointment
- GPS to the clinic
- Connected to the clinic’s WiFi
- Doctor is a specialist in X
Cross some of that, personal info, and ads of treatments for conditions of X.
They don’t need to listen to your mic.
That said, if it’s a fairly common condition, it might be the case you were presented the ad before and never noticed it.
None of those data points apply. It was nothing I had searched for or spoken to anyone until I saw the doctor that day and the Instagram ad was present by the time I had driven home, specifically mentioning the clinical term mentioned by the doctor.
It wasn’t even the stated reason for my visit, it was an afterthought at the end of the appointment… “Oh yeah, as long as I’m here, what is this…?”
People always talk about getting served ads after they talk about something. I think it’s the other way around. The ads put the thought into your brain and then you start talking about it and notice after you’ve already been thinking about it for a while.
It’s well possible and previously tv mic had been used as bugging device. The problem is, way too many security researchers look in system level software of iOS and even other components of the device that such practice will be too risky for apple (same applies for mainstream android products). Also processing realtime audio, finding potentially unrealiable topic from it and doing realtime ad is actually too much work as of today’s tech (might change sooner than you think though).
What, I think, is more practical is to use the whole query after the wake word to show ad, and potentially use other app tracking data, which is way much reliable than voice for targeting purpose. Voice data is useful for bugging purpose, primarily (ab)used by nation states and LE.
I bet in the medical procedure case mentioned in the blog the user searched/talked about that in other apps and average people aren’t good to notice these privacy leaks.
Using your search data is bad enough
