Amazon is eliminating a little-utilized privacy feature available on some of its Echo smart speakers. Starting March 28th, the company will discontinue the “Do Not Send Voice Recordings” option. This feature allowed users to process their voice commands locally on the device, preventing audio from being transmitted to Amazon’s cloud servers.
In an email to customers who used this feature, Amazon stated that the decision to discontinue it was made to “no longer support this feature” as it expands Alexa’s capabilities with generative artificial intelligence. These newer AI features require cloud-based processing.
While this change might raise concerns for privacy-conscious users, the feature wasn’t widely accessible or used. It was only available on three devices: the 4th generation Echo Dot, the Echo Show 10, and the Echo Show 15. Moreover, it was limited to customers in the U.S. with devices set to use the English language. Amazon reported that less than 0.03% of its customers utilized this feature.
Users will still be able to prevent Alexa from saving voice recordings. Customers who had been using the “Do Not Send” feature as of March 28th will be automatically switched to the “Don’t save recordings” option.
“The Alexa experience is designed to protect our customers’ privacy and keep their data secure, and that’s not changing. We’re focusing on the privacy tools and controls that our customers use most and work well with generative AI experiences that rely on the processing power of Amazon’s secure cloud,” Amazon stated.
