Big Brother Listening In

I've noticed some peeople blame their "smart"-'phones.

I don't. Two reasons: firstly the telephone has to be switched on and set to make a voice-call. Secondly, it would need interception by the service-provider, whichI consider unlikely and very likely illegal.

(It would be very illegal in the UK where all telephonic and postal communications are under Official Secrets Act protection - or certainly were. I hope still are.)

Much more likely, there was a legal eavsedropper like an 'Alexa' or perhaps some types of "Smart" television in the room and on at the time. Many people leave things switched on so habitually they forget thay have.

Equally likely, the events were co-incidences. The advertisements would have come anyway, invited by previous use of social-media, on-line shopping, shop loyalty-cards and commercial web-site viewing with the tracking-cookies left on. They were espcially noticeable because they happened to arrive after a conversation about the subject.

......

If you really are frightened of your portable telephone...

Switch it off - unless or until you need make a call or are expecting one for a genuinely important reason.

Unimportant calls can be handled by messages you can read or ring back later.

After all, you don't use it while driving (illegal in many countries anyway), and are polite enough to switch it off for a religious service, public lecture, public library, theatre or other public-entertainment event or simply in an ordinary social gathering... Aren't you?

I did NOT set up the voice activated search on my laptop when I was setting things up...AND I keep the microphone switched off on my laptop! BUT...here's a creepy thing. I saw an ad for a very small heater invented by Elon Musk, which plugs in to a wall socket...and I thought it might be a solution for a friend of mine who is always freezing.

So, I was at HIS house when I told him about it. Apparently my PHONE was listening to me!!! When I got home, ads for that type of heater began popping up on my LAPTOP.

Creepy, huh?

It has happened to me several times. The first couple times I thought it might be just coincidence, but it is not. It has happened on my laptop and on my cell phone ... both.
I believe the opposite, I believe with Trump at the helm it will get even worse. He is a dictator and all dictators want to know what their citizens are doing. I don't think he's any different. I think worse.

Edit: I do not have any devices in my home other thnt 1 laptop and my phone (smart phone). I do not have any Alexa type of devices like someone else implied. I don't even have any devices that could listen other than my laptop and phone. Not even a TV remote that allows for voice commands. Not everything in all countries is the same and to assume so is ignorance. Maybe someone should check their meds 🙄. (know-it-alls are so annoying and rude)

It's never happened to me because I do not own any eavesdropping devices, but one or two of my friends and relatives have recounted similar experiences.

That only happens if you have a device like an 'Alexa' in the room and switched on. It is not the Government who is spying on you - unless you have been doing something to attract attention.

The Government could not care less about your discussions on what colour to paint the bathroom. Also, logically, anyone plotting any crime would make very sure no-one is listening to them in such a crude, simple way as 'Alexa'.

Rather, it is companies like Google who harvest, collate and analyse the information to send to the advertising-agencies and major retailers, so they can try to persuade you which vinyl emulsion to buy.


The existence of a microphone is a given on a telephone! It could not work otherwise, but a microphone merely converts sound to electrical signals. It is the telephone itself that radiates the signal, if a portable rather than land-line (wire or fibre-optical) instrument, as a portable 'phone is a two-way radio. Even then it only transmits a conversation when in use! It does not do so otherwise.

Yes, an intercom on the front door has a microphone and loudspeaker, one at each end, but it does not go anywhere else. Even if its link is wireless the signal strength is so low that it won't be detectable beyond a very short range. All it would show is that someone called at your home, not why nor your conversations. You could use a wired intercomm instead - completely secure.

A microphone on your computer? Perhaps it could be read by the data-harvesters, if you leave it switched on. Switch it off (even unplug it if external). I don't know about other operating-systems but MS Windows 11 gives you quite a lot of control over auxiliaries like cameras and microphones. I use no "Bluetooth" gadgets, and have turned off or "uninstalled" a lot of surplus guff Microsoft foisted on my PC!

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Really you are worrying needlessly, but you are helping commercial entities to exploit you.

The biggest threat to your privacy is a combination of "social-media", on-line shopping from major retailers, bait like loyalty-cards and bank-card payments in supermarkets, commercial "cookies", and "smart"-'speakers operated by Google et. al.

The biggest threat to yoursecurity and safety is from criminals, state-subversive or not, so if the authorities foil them by surveillance over those suspected of potentially being that, better that than you being burgled, defrauded or murdered.

Discuss the emulsion with "Alexa" switched off, and don't hold a loyalty-card for the builder's merchant from whom you buy it in person!

I have not had that happen.

But we do not have Alexa or anything like that, and I have never activated voice recognition on my phone.

I have Alexa and she is always listening. I've even caught her dim herself to listen to me...LOL
But hey, let 'em listen, they wanna listen to me sing or talk in a high pitch voice to my dog...... by all means, I hope they get a laugh out of it 🤣

That is old news, they been spying us for over 100 years. It's just easier now

They call America land of the free. Hate to tell you. But it's not. We lost our freedom after the civil war.

The civil war was not about slavery like they told you in the history books. It was about freedom

I had something similar occur.
Totally forget what it was all about but I was discussing something then ads pertaining to that discussion started showing up.
What the Eff just happened? Freaked me out a little.

Yes I have!

My daughter is convinced this is so, her phone is eavesdropping.

I let my eyes slow down over some chandelier parts while shopping in Walmart and one hour later they appeared on my device connected to a project like one I was doing with glass.
I'm surrounded by fake people who only ever wanted war in Europe.

You refer to the President as a Virus? This all was a part of "The Patriot Act," that was signed 2001.

Silence is golden, and mind reading is impossible, ptrdictably assumed, but not as definitive as postulated.

Living rent free in your head lmao 🤣