Samsung has warned people against
discussing sensitive and private information in
the vicinity of its new smart televisions -
because it will be translated into text and
stored in a central computer.
The new privacy policy for the voice-activated
television allows the company and its partners
to listen in on everything that people say.
The policy states: "Please be aware that if
your spoken words include personal or other
sensitive information, that information will be
among the data captured and transmitted to a
third party through your use of voice
recognition.
"While Samsung will not collect your spoken
word, Samsung may still collect associated
texts and other usage data so that we can
evaluate the performance of the feature and
improve it."
Samsung insists that the data is encrypted to
keep it safe, and points out that owners can
disconnect their TV from wifi to keep their data
secure.
In a statement it said: "In all of our Smart TVs
we employ industry-standard security
safeguards and practices, including data
encryption, to secure consumers' personal
information and prevent unauthorised
collection or use."
However, without an internet connection the
voice recognition feature stops working
entirely.
While lots of voice-recognition devices use
an internet connection to better translate
sounds into actions, the storing and sharing
with third parties is a particular privacy
concern for some Samsung users.
The privacy policy was first highlighted by a
Reddit user, and many of the comments
compared the situation to the
telescreens described in George Orwell novel
1984.
In the book, Orwell wrote: "Any sound that
Winston made, above the level of a very low
whisper, would be picked up by, moreover, so
long as he remained within the field of vision
which the metal plaque commanded, he could
be seen as well as heard."

Less bothered because even their smart phone cannot type my voice commands correctly.