Apple responds to criticism, stops contractors from hearing Siri conversations
Just recently, a scary report revealed how Apple's contractors listened to recordings of private Siri conversations. The revelation raised major alarms around the world, prompting Apple to issue an immediate clarification on the practice. And, now the Cupertino giant went a step ahead and has halted conversation-listening altogether. Here's all about the move.
Contractors listened to Siri recordings for grading, quality control
When the report, published by The Guardian, went viral, Apple clarified that its contractors grade recordings for improving Siri. It said they used just 1% of daily Siri activations to make sure the assistant doesn't activate on its own and handles queries accurately. Also, the recordings are handled in a "secure" manner without being associated with users' Apple IDs, it added.
Now, conversation grading has been halted
The clarification from Apple was similar to that offered by Google and Amazon in similar situations, which, honestly, wasn't a big surprise. But now, the company is taking stringent action to go a step ahead of its competition. Its spokesperson recently issued a statement to The Verge, noting that "While we conduct a thorough review [of the matter], we are suspending Siri grading globally."
Users will get an option to opt into grading
Along with suspending the hearing and grading of Siri recordings, Apple has also confirmed that users will soon get the option to choose if they want their recordings to be graded by human contractors, much like Google/Amazon. Now, that's a wise move, but it remains unclear if the company would keep the recordings of those who'd explicitly choose not to have their conversations graded.
No word on execution of the plan yet
Apple says that the ability to opt-in or out would be rolled out with a future update for iPhones. However, as of now, there's no word on when this might happen or how long the company would take to keep Siri grading halted. Even 'not grading' recordings for long would be problematic as the company wouldn't be able to flag/address possible false-positives and issues.
