Issue 2: Alexa Privacy Gets Creepy(er). Brain Rot & Spotting Scams.
The Alexa privacy settings you need to change, terms you need to know, tips you need to tap, and more...
It’s officially spring and officially cold AF 🥶 on my little island outside of Seattle. It’s been three years since we left the tech-tastic life of the San Francisco Bay Area for the woods, mountains, and closer-to-family world of the PNW. It’s been amazing in all the ways except this damn moody weather.
Yes, I’m from Alaska, but I thawed out in all my years living in the Goldilocks state (never too hot, never too cold, always jusssttt right). I say this while wearing my parka at my desk—indoors—still a little butthurt over the fake-out spring we just went through: It warmed up for a week. Little flower buds are poking out. The animals are shedding enough fur to stuff all the pillowcases (pretty sure I still have some in my mouth from petting my dog an hour ago). Then, wham! It slammed us all with a cold, wet, slap-across-the-face winter blast. Rude.
Speaking of rude… let’s jump into our big story this week:
Would you let a stranger eavesdrop in your home and keep the recordings? For most people, the answer is, “Are you crazy?” — Geoffrey Fowler, Washington Post
Amazon dials back an Alexa privacy option — what you need to know:
If you’ve got an Alexa device sitting on your kitchen counter (or next to your bed…) now’s the time to double-check what it’s collecting — and keeping — about you.
Go ahead. We’ll wait.
In the Alexa app, go to:
Settings (I had to tap this little “MORE” symbol at the bottom of my screen → Alexa Privacy → Review Voice History.
Be ready to lose some serious chunks of your life tapping, reading, and listening to everything it’s eavesdropped on over the years. Amazon has detailed instructions on how to access Alexa settings across your devices here, too.
Starting one week from today, the Echo Dot (4th gen) speaker, Echo Show 10, or Echo Show 15 smart display will send all your voice recordings to the cloud, even if you tell it not to.
Why does that matter?
Every time you ask Alexa for a weather update or to play your favorite song, that audio doesn’t just disappear. It heads straight to Amazon’s servers, where it’s stored and used to fine-tune Alexa’s artificial intelligence. Those recordings can stick around indefinitely (as you can see above) — unless you tweak some pretty confusing and buried settings. In the past, Amazon workers have listened to these recordings without our permission, and some have even ended up getting sent to strangers.
What’s changing exactly?
Starting March 28, Amazon is retiring a lesser-known feature that kept some simple voice requests — like asking the time or turning on a light — local to the device. Instead, nearly everything will route through Amazon’s cloud as the company ramps up for a new AI-powered Alexa+.
Amazon says the change reflects what people actually use and told USA Today that less than 0.03% of Echo owners opted to use the "Do Not Send Voice Recordings" feature. But it’s also a reminder: these smart assistants collect way more than most of us realize.
What you can do about it:
There’s a part of me that’s thought, who cares if the world hears random snippets of my life? Then I played a bunch of those random snippets and it’s incredibly creepy. Most of the time, it hears something that sounds like it’s wake-up word (Alexa) but isn’t, like;
Texas
“elect a”
“detect a”
These are just a few words I heard uttered on the saved voice recordings that triggered Alexa to store a voice snippet from me in the past.
Aside from ditching the device or turning off the speaker whenever you’re not actively using, here’s your best move: stop Alexa from saving your voice recordings altogether.
In the Alexa app, go to:
Settings → Alexa Privacy → Manage Your Alexa Data → Don’t save recordings.
There’s no real upside to letting Amazon store your commands — just potential risks if that data ever leaks or gets misused. “The more you save today, the more that can be breached tomorrow,” privacy expert Albert Fox Cahn told the Washington Post’s Shira Ovide.
Other tips: Keep your Echo out of private spaces like bedrooms. Unplug it when you’re having sensitive conversations — about money, health, or anything else you don’t want overheard.
Bottom line: Voice assistants should make life easier — not cost you your privacy.
“Digital bits of ourselves are being fed into corporations’ computers and we can’t know how they might be misused. We may need personal empowerment and regulation to wrest back some control.” — Shira Ovide, Washington Post
🗣️ Let’s Talk About It
Do you care about this latest privacy change getting made for you? Comment in this article or join the conversation with me above in the “chat” space, on Instagram, LinkedIn, or TikTok. (It’s not lost on me that social media isn’t the most secure place in the world either…)
More On My Mind this Week
Here are some of the other topics we’re covering & talking about:
How to Spot a Scam. I pretty much don’t trust any text, email, voice call, or smoke signal that comes in unsolicited these days, and I tell our kids and parents not to trust them either. If you don’t actually know the person it’s from, check with me or your other tech-savvy friends before you do literally (!) anything else. Or, Google “is the text message about (___fill in the blank__) a scam? The FTC sent me a nice note about reminding readers of just how bad the dirty-rotten-scammers are getting these days. Do you know the most common signs of a scammer? Read about it here. And see what happened in my own family, here.
🚨LET’S TALK🚨 → Scams!
I’m working on a bigger series on this topic. Have you — or someone you care about — been the victim of a scam? I want to hear from you and maybe, just maybe, help you get back everything you lost and then some…
‼️MUST WATCH OF THE WEEK‼️ Meg Oliver’s CBS “Eye on America” story is a must-watch this week.
Her story is on Brain Rot. That’s the latest term for what too much time on our gadgets is doing to our bodies and brains. For teens? It’s worse. There’s a good chance you know this if you have a teen or have recently raised one. I cannot scream loudly enough about how important this topic is.
Also? I love Meg. A million years ago, when I was a baby reporter for NBC in Missoula, Montana, Meg was my dear friend and colleague starting her career in Kalispell. She was a brilliant, magical, sparkling human then, and remains one of the best there is today. 🫶🏼
🚨LET’S TALK🚨 → Digital parenting!
I’m constantly working on a story around this topic. Parents, what tool do you wish existed to help you raise your constantly connected kids? What’s working and what’s not? (And holy hell, I’m so glad social media didn’t exist when that picture was taken above!)
Term of the Week: FUD. I learned the term "FUD" (rhymes with “dud”) this week, which stands for "fear, uncertainty, and doubt." I had to Google it mid-conference call. I guess it’s a marketing term that’s been around a while, but maybe never more relevant than the wild times we’re living in now.
Here’s what I do about it:
✨ One of the best uses of personal tech in my life is dictating “three good things about today,” into a private note via Siri. I’ve been doing this nightly since my late teens (before cell phones, back when we had to actually write stuff by hand) long before I knew to call it a “gratitude practice.” It always, always, always eases “FUD.”
That’s you!
In case I haven’t told you yet, I’m grateful for you. For this connection and this chance to have a meaningful conversation. Makes me smile every time I think about it.
Another thing that’s helped recently? My friend recommended this Mel Robbins podcast episode. I especially love the weekly “brain dump.” It’s working.
Be sure to drop me a line (or jump into the chat in the tab above) and let me know what you think about when you think about tech.
Ask your questions, share your genius tips and tricks, all of it. I’m happy you’re here.
- XO Jenn
Coming up next week — the segments I’m wrangling gadgets for right now, including Earth Day, Mother’s Day, A Summer Fitness Gadget Shape-Up Series, and so much more!