The Amazon Echo is here to stay. The technology that powers it is one of the largest ever innovations in home AI and its getting better with each passing month.
While this really is the first generation of home assistant and we’re all very excited for what this could mean moving forward, we do have to look at every side of the coin. In this case, it’s the fact that there is a piece of hardware in your house that is listening to every word you say.
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Now, while the thought of that is rather unsettling, we do have certain assurances. While Alexa’s microphone is always active, you still have to use its “wake word” for them to start recording and actively listening to you.
These voice clips are saved into the cloud, so every time you address her, your request is being saved by Amazon. Luckily, these recordings of your voice are simple enough to access and remove.
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How to delete Amazon Echo voice data
- Go into your Alexa app, and navigate your way to Settings.
- Go to History. Here you can see your voice recordings and you may delete or keep them as you wish.
- If you’d rather get rid of all the recordings in one go, then find your way to Amazon’s website and log in.
- Go to Your Devices, then Echo Dot, and then Manage voice recordings. You will have an option here to purge all of the saved records.
It’s great to see Amazon being so open with this, as there is nothing complicated about getting to, accessing and deleting your voice records if you want to.
If you’re still worried about Alexa listening to you then there is always a mute button on top of the device. This will completely deactivate the microphone so she won’t be able to hear anything at all.