CHAT Good Grief! Strange occurrence with tablet and Google tonight

[Knoxville's Joker]

I was driving last weekend and had to turn on Google maps to try to find an address. While driving the voice said stalled vehicle ahead. Now how would google maps know there is a stalled vehicle?

And why the only thing smart in my house is my phone for my dumb@$$. Sorry the joke was too much to resist... But no really I avoid smart devices like the plague as I know they spy by default...

 

[helen]

This just hit my inbox. It says I can opt out.

You can use Find My Device today to locate devices when they’re connected to the internet. With the new Find My Device network, you’ll be able to locate your devices even if they’re offline. You can also find any compatible Fast Pair accessories when they’re disconnected from your device. This includes compatible earbuds and headphones, and trackers that you can attach to your wallet, keys, or bike.

To help you find your items when they’re offline, Find My Device will use the network of over a billion devices in the Android community and store your devices’ recent locations.

How it works

Devices in the network use Bluetooth to scan for nearby items. If other devices detect your items, they’ll securely send the locations where the items were detected to Find My Device. Your Android devices will do the same to help others find their offline items when detected nearby.

 

[Melodi]

Several years ago, I was telling Nightwolf about Alexa and some of the creepy things happening with the then-new "speaker" you could have in your home. We were joking about having a spy in the house. At which point Nightwolf said in a loud voice:

"Alexa, are you spying on me?"

And a voice from the depths of the books on my table said,

"No, I am not spying on you"

We both nearly jumped out of our skins!

I had recently bought a new Kindle and didn't know that Alexa was on there or that I needed to disable it. It was hidden under everyone on the crowded table.

That was funny in a way but also extremely creepy.

It would be over a year before I noticed the "Talk about Dishwashers and you get adverts for Diswahers"...

 

[Quiet Man]

For anyone not convinced, do this small demonstration of what your iPhone is capable of:
Go to Settings, Accessibility, Live Captions, turn-on Live Captions ,then tap the microphone icon and start talking.

It can, of course, do this surreptitiously (as directed by relevant security institutions) and upload the data at any time without your knowing.

Rest assured that soon all modern digital appliances will be capable of this, and those enabled with a video camera(s) will have similar abilities with respect to what it 'sees' (identification of people, transcription of text (iPhone already does this extremely well), evaluation of your psychological state, prediction of your actions, etc.). Think phones, TVs, Cars, kitchen appliances, etc.

All this, and more, is coming, and will be used against the people -- UNLESS WE STOP IT.