@pluralistic

#Privacy #SurveillanceCapitalism #Amazon's #Alexa

(3/3)

... felony punishable by a five-year prison sentence and a $500,000 fine for a first offense."

//

Source:
https://pluralistic.net/2025/03/15/altering-the-deal/#telescreen

@pluralistic

#Privacy #SurveillanceCapitalism #Amazon's #Alexa

(2/n)

... for a copyrighted work:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/24/record-scratch/#autoenshittification

That means that once Amazon reaches over the air to stir up the guts of your Echo, no one is allowed to give you a tool that will let you get inside your Echo and change the software back. Sure, it's your property, but exercising sole and despotic dominion over it requires breaking the digital lock that controls access to the firmware, and that's a...

@pluralistic

#Privacy #SurveillanceCapitalism #Amazon's #Alexa

(1/3)

Amazon annihilates Alexa privacy settings, turns on continuous, nonconsensual audio uploading

Is this globally?

How e. g. in the EU.
US laws don't apply there.

"If the #Echo is your property, how come Amazon gets to break it? Because we passed a law that lets them. Section 1201 of 1998's #DigitalMillenniumCopyrightAct makes it a felony to "bypass an access control"...

https://pluralistic.net/2025/03/15/altering-the-deal/#telescreen

Everything you say to your Echo will be sent to #Amazon starting on March 28

"Since Amazon announced plans for a generative AI version of Alexa, we were concerned about user privacy. With Alexa+ rolling out to Amazon Echo devices in the coming weeks, we’re getting a clearer view at the privacy concessions people will have to make to maximize usage of the AI voice assistant and avoid bricking functionality of already-purchased devices.

In an email sent to customers today, Amazon said that Echo users will no longer be able to set their devices to process Alexa requests locally and, therefore, avoid sending voice recordings to Amazon’s cloud. Amazon apparently sent the email to users with “Do Not Send Voice Recordings” enabled on their Echo. Starting on March 28, recordings of everything spoken to the Alexa living in Echo speakers and smart displays will automatically be sent to Amazon and processed in the cloud."

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/03/everything-you-say-to-your-echo-will-be-sent-to-amazon-starting-on-march-28/

Mozilla can suspend or end anyone’s access to Firefox at any time for any reason, including if Mozilla decides not to offer Firefox anymore.

Does this sound like any Open Source app or organisation that you know? Or does this sound like proprietary software? It begs the question will Firefox remain Open Source?

5/N

Every once in a while, Mozilla may decide to update these Terms. We will post the updated Terms online. We will take your continued use of Firefox as acceptance of such changes. We will post an effective date at the top of this page to make it clear when we made our most recent update.

Why not use Firefox to notify changes? There's already a version check. User hostile / deceptive pattern. Very techbro

4/N