As a kid you were told it was a bad idea to stick beans in your ears. Today, you can spend $170 to pop some high-tech beans in your ears! These wireless earbuds from Samsung look like shiny beans and come in red, bronze, white, or black. The have the standard wireless headphone features -- active noise cancelling, high quality audio, a charging case, and Bluetooth connection to your phone or computer. All sounds fine and dandy, but how comfortable is it to walk around with beans in your ear all day?
What could happen if something goes wrong?
These headphones come with a voice assistant name Bixby that will listen for your voice commands. Samsung says they may use your interactions with Bixby to learn more about you and then target you with adds or share this data with others who may use it to target you. That means it's possible you could ask Bixby to play lots of sappy, love songs over and over. Marketers could use this information to target you with ads for very expensive engagement rings. Love sick you spends way too much money on a ring for your significant other and you get turned down leaving your poor and heart broken. OK, this is probably not likely, but also not impossible in our digital ad economy.
Can it snoop on me?
Camera
Device: No
App: No
Microphone
Device: Yes
App: No
Tracks location
Device: No
App: Yes
What can be used to sign up?
No
Phone
No
Third-party account
No
What data does the company collect?
Personal
Name, email, phone number, date of birth, gender
Body related
Voice recordings
Social
How does the company use this data?
How can you control your data?
What is the company’s known track record of protecting users’ data?
In February, 2020, Samsung had a data breach on it UK customer account pages, effecting less than 150 people.
Can this product be used offline?
User-friendly privacy information?
Links to privacy information
Does this product meet our Minimum Security Standards?
Encryption
Uses encryption in transit and at rest.
Strong password
Security updates
Manages vulnerabilities
Samsung has a bug bounty program, which means that anyone who finds a security issue and discloses it responsibly may get paid. https://security.samsungmobile.com/rewardsProgram.smsb
Privacy policy
Samsung has a page highlighting it's privacy principles
Does the product use AI?
Is this AI untrustworthy?
What kind of decisions does the AI make about you or for you?
Is the company transparent about how the AI works?
Does the user have control over the AI features?
Dive Deeper
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Samsung cops to data leak after unsolicited '1/1' Find my Mobile push notificationThe Register
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