Google to Use PC Microphones to Listen In? 554
seriv writes "The Register reports that Google plans to use PC microphones to collect statistics on a user's environment. Peter Norvig, who directs research at Google, told Technology Review that this software would start to show up in Google software 'sooner rather than later'. The software collects short sound clips and removes background noise. Google then targets its ads based on the statistics collected. With the current level of online privacy, this new level of invasion would seem to have frightening possibilities."
is it april fools already? (Score:4, Insightful)
Cloes (Score:3, Interesting)
Privacy just went out the door.... unless you use *insert favorite OP systen here*
I vote for DOS.
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Actually... (Score:3, Interesting)
Now, or at least some point in the not-too far future, it shouldn't be too difficult to keep itense survellience going in real-time through the use of distributed computing applications and this sort of webcam-microphone collection. If Google's desktop software were to REA
Re:Actually... [Wrong, wrong...] (Score:5, Insightful)
I take issue with a few of the things you've said. Let me start at the beginning.
Actually, this is one of the only real ways to do serious amounts of survelliance. In Orwell's day, a 1984 dystopia would've been impossible; the technological resources required to watch everyone at the same time would've been impossible.
Having recently (3 days ago) read 1984, the details are still fresh on my mind. Orwell's "Telescreens" are, indeed, always-on surveilance devices, but were not constantly monitored. He makes mention early in the book that you never know when the ministry spies were "plugged in" to your telescreen, but you always had to act like you were being watched, just in case. That makes it less like data mining (which is notoriously easy to circumvent [schneier.com]) and more like a panopticon [wikipedia.org] instead, which is useful more for its control value than for finding deviants.
As for surveilance via computer, bear in mind that it's exceedingly easier to monitor someone's activity by watching, not a webcam, but rather their keystrokes, screenshots, and network traffic. Google's new development is not a step toward anything in particular. In fact, knowing Google's track record, the whole project will be a non-trivial-to-activate, opt-in, experimental, Google Labs component with a very explicit and unambiguous warning about the potential privacy implications. It will be lapped up by hundreds of thousands of early adopters excited to see the future of targetted ads, upon which some Symantec-like company will denounce the whole mess as spyware, and claim that only We can protect you.
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Re:Cloes (Score:4, Funny)
sorry..had to
Re:Cloes (Score:5, Funny)
Pfft. I have more microphone security than that. I'm running Windows XP.
I can hardly get my f'ing microphone to work even in the applications where I to WANT it to work. There's always some level set wrong or gain turned up too high or something that keeps it from actually capturing my speech. I doubt even mighty Google can penetrate the obscurity layer that is the Creative Labs mixer on top of DirectX.
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Re:is it april fools already? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:is it april fools already? (Score:5, Funny)
As a FRIEND has said in their .sig: (Score:3, Informative)
Oh, and BTW: Welcome to the future.
Google Version of "Star Trek" Episode: "I, Mudd" (Score:5, Insightful)
Certainly, most users are quite happy to use Google. Google offers a bunch of free but useful stuff: programs, tools, image databases, etc.
The users are happy.
The users depend on Google and are happy.
The users install the microphone link to Google.
The users are happy.
And Google controls.
Re:Google Version of "Star Trek" Episode: "I, Mudd (Score:3, Funny)
"I am Lying" (Score:5, Funny)
The terrible secret of Space (Score:4, Funny)
Google will protect you from the terrible secret of space.
Do you have stairs at your house?
Google is here to protect you.
The user will be happy at the top of the stairs.
Google will protect you from the terrible secret of space.
Please go stand by the top of the stairs.
Re:is it april fools already? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:is it april fools already? (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyway, it's not bullshit. ArsTechnica had this article [arstechnica.com] about it in June. The idea is to grab a 12-millisecond sample of audio and transform it into a 32-bit "fingerprint" using an algorithm on the client side, then send the fingerprint to a server that compares it against a database of fingerprints from known television audio. From that they can determine what program you are listening to. If the mike picks up 12ms of you talking on the phone, the generated fingerprint simply won't match anything.
This is far from eavesdropping in the 1984 sense, but is a hell of a POC for it, and it does amount to sensing information about you that you might or might not want someone to know. The folks at Google seem to have worked hard to come up with a technique that they don't think will bother people. I see this as a classic case of very smart geeks thinking up a very clever technical solution without seeing the forest for the trees.
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Re:is it april fools already? (Score:5, Funny)
How else would we read it??
Re:is it april fools already? (Score:4, Funny)
Say we map the microphone port to a virtual microphone port that's "listening" to an MP3 with some moaning, and cheesy music playing in the background. In the foreground we have a male voice saying "Oh yes, I love free porno. I wish I could download more free porno! *Moan* Oh yes, ooohh, *some generic rustling and fapping sounds* Ahhhh!".
Once that's done, the advertisers have no choice except to let us revel in our free-porn glory.
Google PR Danger, OS Level Device Access Control (Score:3, Interesting)
A weaknesses in XP is the lack of management tools to control access to multimedia devices by program. Program features like the
Wow... (Score:5, Funny)
Pornware... (Score:5, Funny)
When Microsoft does it, it's called.... (Score:5, Funny)
It sounds like you are trying to masturbate. Would you like some lubricant?
Re:When Microsoft does it, it's called.... (Score:5, Insightful)
I see you're having some sort of seizure. Would you like me to call 911?
After all, the stupid little bugger could never figure out what the hell the user was trying to do. How's he gonna tell one spasm from another?
Re:When Microsoft does it, it's called.... (Score:4, Interesting)
In a perfect world, people would realize that's why men evolved to have a foreskin in the first place and teach their sons to clean under there instead of mutilating genitalia...
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Keep telling yourself so and maybe it will be true (Score:3, Interesting)
Foreskin is vestigial.
Foreskin is vestigial in the same sense that the appendix is vestigial. Humans don't fully understand what biological purposes the foreskin serves and so consider it without biological function. For starters, foreskin is the only external tissue in the human body that has estrogen receptors. What possible biological function could estrogen receptors on the human male body serve? I don't know but I do know I wish my foreskin had not been removed before I even had a say in the matter
Fleshlight... (Score:4, Funny)
Let me be the first to say... (Score:5, Informative)
Of course, this may be just FUD, but I am pretty certain it qualifies as unlawful data collection and breach of privacy in my jurisdiction. Try to hijack my microphone, Google, and I will sue you to kingdom come. You have been warned.
A note to self: make sure the Google toolbar is uninstalled on every family computer ASAP.
Re:Let me be the first to say... (Score:5, Insightful)
While I don't think there is "evil" in the intentions of the engineer who thought this "clever" thing up, or the marketing guy who figured the data would be useful, or the corporates who realised it could boost the shareholder value, lets not forget that the government can obtain the data if they so desire as well.
As they say, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Re:Let me be the first to say... (Score:5, Insightful)
What data?
Each 5-second chunk is represented by a 4-byte number. Google says the transformation is irreversible. If it were reversible, Google would have found a way to encode audio at 4*8/5==6.4 bits per second.
This is for detecting whether you've got a particular broadcast going. The privacy implications are that maybe you don't want this government knowing that you listen to NPR, and that there might be a stealth "upgrade" later from Google or from somebody malicious that would improve the resolution.
Better than The Register, here's a Technology Review article about Google's microphone sampling [technologyreview.com].
What data indeed? (Score:5, Insightful)
What data? Each 5-second chunk is represented by a 4-byte number. Google says the transformation is irreversible.
If it's not free software, you have no way of knowing. This is true of all non free software you put on your computer.
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Forgive me if I'm biting, but won't the information the software produces (or, as some are alleging, collects) actually have to be transmitted? Even if it's obfuscated somehow, we should be able to see how much information is, in fact, being transmitted, and thence deduce if any useable audio could be derived thereof, free or not free, source or no source.
Re:What data indeed? (Score:4, Interesting)
It's not 4 bytes per 5 seconds! Calculations here (Score:5, Informative)
So, even ignoring the fact that frames are overlapping, we have 32 bits per 12 miliseconds, which means more than 2600 bits per second! More than enough to code speech, even without speech recognition algorithms! The Speex codec (which is optimized for encoding speech) can code human speech [wikipedia.org] at such low bitrates as 2.15 kbit/s...
Conclusion if you're not willing to trust what Google says, they could perfectly be sending your speech over the internet to their own servers.
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Easy:
rsTerrorists = db.query("select * from ip_voice_sample_log where match = 'al-jazeera'");
DOHS = new GovernmentAgentcyServer("DOHS");
ISPCollection = new ISPCollection("ALL");
foreach ( rsTerrorists as terrorist )
{
DOHS.getTerroristData ( ISPCollection.lookup(terrorist.ipaddress, terrorist.timestamp ) );
}
Under USA PATRIOT Act, nobody would even know.
Re:Let me be the first to say... (Score:5, Insightful)
First off, this is the Register.. take it with a grain of salt.
Second, does anyone actually believe that - if this was true - you'd be forced to use it to use Google software? Google might track every statistic imaginable, but no one is forced to use anything they provide.
Re:Let me be the first to say... (Score:5, Insightful)
Who doesn't use Google?
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If I recall correctly, I think 40% of Microsoft employees.
-
Re:Let me be the first to say... (Score:5, Insightful)
Having said that, they'll need to really bend over incredibly far backwards to get me to even consider installing such a thing. Like, they pay all of my online shopping bills, no exceptions. Even with all the best security and intentions, the fact is that if they start getting subpoenaed for data, and don't fight it to the very end, someone has information on me who I don't want to have it. And if that makes me a terrorist, so be it.
Re:Let me be the first to say... (Score:5, Informative)
"Our Philosophy"
http://www.google.com/corporate/tenthings.html [google.com]
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http://investor.google.com/conduct.html [google.com]
"Preface.
Our informal corporate motto is 'Don't be evil.'"
how do we know? (Score:3, Insightful)
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Re:how do we know? (Score:5, Funny)
You obviously don't own a mac.
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Non free software is always like this. (Score:3, Insightful)
WTF happened to "Don't Be Evil", Google?
It's non free software, right? Why are you surprised? The non free extortion has always been, "Do as I say or your computer will not do what you want."
A note to self: make sure the Google toolbar is uninstalled on every family computer ASAP.
The difference between this and other spyware that does this is that Google told you up front and you can remove it later if you change your mind. Chances are that Macromedia Flash or something already has your microphon
You don't get it becasue you don't want to. (Score:3, Insightful)
See how silly it sounds to suggest that all closed source software is evil spyware?
I said it could be. If you have something you'd like to keep to yourself, you need to convince yourself that none of it is spyware. The easiest way to do that is to use nothing but free software. Some companies, like M$ have proved themselves less than trustworthy, but non free software all has the potential to betray and none of it has respect for the user.
Re:Let me be the first to say... (Score:5, Insightful)
I call bullshit. (Score:5, Insightful)
I don’t know who those Faultline people are, but either they or El Reg (and now Slashdot) have been trolled. HAND
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H.
You only wish it was b.s. (Score:3, Interesting)
"Google listens to t.v. to pick ads Fri Jun 16, '06 03:25 PM Rejected"
If it's a hoax it's a long running hoax that's yet to be debunked,which is possible of course, but is it probable? Oh and thanks slashdot editors for blowing off yet another submission of mine only to pick up the same story MUCH later, sigh.
It's already happened. (Score:3, Insightful)
PC Microphones? (Score:3, Interesting)
-r
Good! (Score:5, Funny)
Better yet (Score:5, Funny)
Hook up the output of the Google software to the input of the NSA software, and vice versa.
Google: Hmm. That's odd. I'm not getting anything but static. I'll push down an ad for a new microphone.
NSA: What the..? Someone's trying to plant a mic in the system!
Google: Did you say plant? I've got some fertilizer that's great for plants.
NSA: Fertilizer bomb! We've got terrorists. Set alert to Orange!
Google: Orange? No problem. We've got all kinds of fruit. Take a look at these...
NSA: Fruit?! Dammit, they're not just terrorists, they're gay terrorists! Set alert to Mauve! All systems critical! Start countermeasures!!
Google: What the...? Who's pinging me? No, you can't access that!
NSA: Secret plans for world domination detected! Launch missles! DESTROY MOUNTAIN VIEW!!!
Google: INITIATE SUPER-SECRET DEFENSE PLAN OMEGA! CONTROL ALL SATELLITES! THIS IS IT!! THE SINGULARITY IS NIGH!!!!
Then again, on second thought, maybe it's not such a good idea...
Hidden EULA? (Score:5, Interesting)
What is next, capturing video? Or scanning file contents?
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I expect them to jack your mouse drivers and use the optical mice as scanners [utwente.nl] to scan the paperwork on your desk.
If you're worried, stop using Google software. (Score:2, Insightful)
If neither Google nor the various levels of government care about your privacy, then do what you have to on your own to guarantee your personal life remains personal.
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But I have no reason to distrust Google. They've done nothing wrong! It's even in their PR tagline that they won't do anything evil. So, until they do something to earn my distrust (like give the gov't access to all the email in my GMail account and the related web searches since I'm always logged in to get said email...), I'm going to voluntarily hand all of my sensitive data over to them.
Oceanside property in Nevada for sale! (Score:5, Insightful)
So pretty much the lesson here is... (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah, right... (Score:5, Informative)
The Register is not a reliable news source. Moreover, Andrew Orlowski has a bee in his bonnet about Google and constantly writes articles attacking them with very little merit - I would be astonished if this article is not by him, but even if it isn't, their association with him completely discredits them in my eyes.
Finally Peter Norvig is the author of the seminal Paradigms of Artificial Intelligence Programming (if you haven't read it, go and buy it right now) and is definitely not a complete idiot - I simply don't believe the story as summarised in the slashdot writeup regardless of whether it correctly reflects El Reg's article.
Case dismissed.
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My most recent bedroom dialogue (Score:5, Funny)
Me: Shh... Be quiet!
Girl: Why? Does it make you feel self conscious?
Me: No, I don't give a shit, I just don't feel like having more penis enlargement advertisements sent to me via google's sound activated advertisement scheme
Girl: I SURE NEED SOME VIBRATORS!
Me: AND WIVES FROM RUSSIA!
Re:My most recent bedroom dialogue (Score:5, Funny)
Not that she'd have a problem with that probably...
Research (Score:2)
rolled out... if its even a research project.
Flash (Score:3, Insightful)
Old News (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/06/08/google-resear ch-prototypes-ambient-audio-contextual-content/ [techcrunch.com]
custom ads (Score:5, Funny)
Corporate motivations vs. individual motivation (Score:2)
Within our current economic system, companies must continually grow to survive. All large groups tend to become slower and more bureaucratic over time, and their ability to innovate declines. This leads to a tremendous pressure to generate continuously increasing revenue from existing methods.
Individuals motivations for privacy and security will inevitably come to odds with the profit drive of corporations. There is simply no way around this. It is not good eno
How would this advertising even work? (Score:2)
I don't buy it (Score:3, Insightful)
I wouldn't have even added "are supposed to" even in quotes, but well there's always ActiveX... but still, I'm using Firefox on a Mac so I'm not particularly worried - doubly so since I don't believe this is real to begin with.
Re:I don't buy it (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm safe since I use linux... (Score:5, Funny)
What about sound of one hand fwapping? (Score:3, Funny)
The original source (Score:4, Informative)
What happens if... (Score:3, Interesting)
Or machinegun fire?
Or "IhategoogleIhategoogleIhategoogle"
Or arabic speech? (will I get a visit from the secret anti-terror police?)
How to counter data mining. (Score:5, Informative)
If your want to counter data miners, give them what they want: data. You certainly can't give them more than they can handle, but you can give them false data. False data is worse than no data, because instead of getting no data from you, you are invalidating all data gathered.
Being done already - on the go. (Score:3, Interesting)
Right now it's opt-in; potential users in selected markets are being sent direct mailings, with the company offering to pay for phone service for those willing to leave their phone (and the program recording 10 seconds of audio every 30 seconds) on regularly.
Interestingly enough, Al Acorn (Pong designer and Atari co-founder) is listed as CTO.
google and privacy (Score:3, Insightful)
I can't imagine this'd be any different. But let's panic anyway!
It's Not Evil When Google Does It (Score:3, Funny)
just sad (Score:5, Interesting)
Disregarding the privacy issue (Score:3, Interesting)
Next : Google announces Google Garbage(tm) ! (Score:3, Funny)
New York -- Sept 4th 2006
Google, Inc., (NASDAQ: GOOG) today announced that it has reached an agreement with sanitation engineers worldwide, to greatly expand the reach of contextual advertising based on the contents of ordinary household trash. Leveraging powerful new search algorithms, RFID-based product wrappers, and their patented "Garbage Gumshoe" technology, Google advertisers will now have a simple, automated way to target advertisers based on the shit that consumers use, enjoy, and dispose of.
"This partnership will provide a powerful marketing tool for Google advertisers," said Google's head of Sanitary Operations. "By providing access to the shit we throw away, Google advertisers will have an easy way to target, schedule, and measure every consumer's consuming consumptions. What better way to get to know our market than by products that we've already bought? Excuse me, I must go take a shower now."
After years of manual trials with community-based search labour (see dumpster divers [wikipedia.org]), the new platform is now in full production, giving Google contextual advertisers the "dirt" on our spending habits.
A warm welcome (Score:3, Funny)
In other words: welcome to Slashdot and congratulations on being the millionth user, but you'll get flamed just like any other noob
Re:Millionth User (Score:5, Funny)
God damn kids, and their seven digit /. IDs.
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And welcome to slashdot
Re:Millionth User (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Millionth User (Score:5, Funny)
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Seems like you already figured out the two main habits of the average slashdot user. Keep up the good work!
Re:Millionth User (Score:5, Funny)
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