Amazon says it has made changes after several owners of its Amazon Echo reported their devices laughing, talking or playing music without being prompted.
In a statement, Amazon says “In rare circumstances, Alexa can mistakenly hear the phrase ‘Alexa, laugh.’ We are changing that phrase to be ‘Alexa, can you laugh?’ which is less likely to have false positives, and we are disabling the short utterance ‘Alexa, laugh.’ We are also changing Alexa’s response from simply laughter to ‘Sure, I can laugh’ followed by laughter.”
Amazon says the update on the devices happened automatically.
Sharon Foley received her Amazon Echo as a Christmas gift.
“We use it for the weather in the morning and we always just say goodnight,” she says.
Though it hasn’t randomly started laughing, Foley says she heard it come on the other night before bed when she was in another room.
“It has come on and it might start a sentence or sing a few lines and then shut off,” Foley says.
CTV technology analyst Carmi Levy says it’s concerning that companies are not sharing where the information goes once a device hears it.
“When you install one of these speakers in your home you do need to be aware of the fact that it is listening and if you are concerned you’ll probably want to unplug,” Levy says.
