Short of owning several acres and being able to essentially build a faraday home, you’re effectively going to be in the United Stasi of America.
This is not partisan matter short of the people against the ruling class tyrants that always exempt themselves of everything they impose on others. This started a long time ago and all ad insertions went along with it, that includes those the system has presented to you as your champions as well as those they’ve dialectically framed as your arch nemeses.
- Governments can now learn even more about you when they confiscate your device.
- Devices confiscated at airports provide a full history of you.
- Privacy issues: will my conversation with someone using this tech truly be private? Do I have to be careful what I say around everyone by default? Always have clear thought out opinions?
- Personal relations: spouses, friends, relatives demanding to see your history to check up on you and what you've been 'thinking'?
- Society where nothing can be assumed to be private by default
- Slippery slope...
Anyone got any other issues they can think of?
https://www.romanolaw.com/can-i-record-a-conversation-in-mas... (Linking to discussion, not the statute, because it confirms that it is in fact enforced.)
Come to think of it, this would also include smart glasses, etc. And whatever those LG devices were doing. Paging the AG...
I hear this a lot but such a perspective elides the novelty (and the actual question):
If I devise a mechanical device that semi-faithfully creates marks that convey information about a conversation - but which does not offer a way to replay the conversation whatsoever - does that constitute a recording subject to two-party consent?
If so, how does this relate to a potential decision to write notes about a call right after as a memo/in my diary?
If so, how does this relate to having my secretary record the conversation in shorthand while listening furtively to the conversation?
https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartIV/TitleI/Cha...
The term ''interception'' means to secretly hear, secretly record,
or aid another to secretly hear or secretly record the contents of
any wire or oral communication through the use of any intercepting
device by any person other than a person given prior authority by
all parties to such communication.
The term ''contents'', when used with respect to any wire or
oral communication, means any information concerning the identity
of the parties to such communication or the existence, contents,
substance, purport, or meaning of that communication.
So first question, "devise a mechanical device" -- violates. Second, "write notes", no. Third question, "secretary record" -- no.
Not sure why my comment merited a downvote.
Laws like this provide cover for abusers and deceivers, by preemptively spoiling objective evidence and making any accusations depend on hearsay instead.
For me, I don't want to live in a world where if I say something embarrassing or not well thought out, someone pushes a button and the last 15 seconds is transcribed as evidence. That's a different world to the previous one where it would be someone's word fori it.
As for the fact that phone could already do this, that's not the point. Phone users have to go out of their way to make it happen so it's generally unlikely to happen. The watch feature though is always on and just waiting for you to press "save last 15 seconds"
Really disagree on this, I think all states should be two party consent, personally.
> Why should it be illegal for me to remember exactly a conversation that I participated in, instead of only being allowed to have a vague recollection?
It's not illegal, it's just that the other person has to know that you're doing that and consent to it.
Giving them the chance to walk away or to tell a person and their Meta glasses to fuck off is important.
I want to record every conversation surreptitiously, because that’s the only way to catch them.
The reason we can’t is because our politicians and legislators are the biggest liars of them all. It would spell their immediate downfall.
Whatever side you come down on, privacy doesn't stand a chance against a small amount of convenience.
‘Listening’ sort of implies intelligence is paying attention to what is said. It’s more ‘hearing’ than ‘listening’
There are documents on how these activation words work
I really wish these conversations would shift to the scarier truth: companies collect so much metadata on everyone that they can make pretty good guesses without processing what you're saying.
If you think "oh hey I was just talking about socks, how did they know to show me an ad for socks" it's likely because they accurately predicted based on your behaviors that you are highly likely to be in the market for socks right now.
Or you’re talking about socks because of the previous ad for socks you saw. I suspect ads drive our collective behaviour more than we realize.
None of the companies would have an incentive to report it.
The tech is already included in the iPhone, and storage requirements are in the hundreds of Megabytes, not more. The device is a black box on purpose, and my informed opinion is that they have been logging the ambient text-to-speech since a long time.
I’m sure the NSA is salivating at this and I don’t trust the current administration not to legislate back doors.
Terrible misstep from Apple from my perspective. This is their “they removed Don’t Be Evil from the website” moment for me.
This is already normalized in most modern office buildings. There are video and audio recording devices in virtually all common areas. This started a bit after private offices were done away with.
You may have a different understanding of the word "complete" than the standard definition.
Unless you are claiming the verifiers kept the watches being tested under constant survellance for several years, the proof you are alluding to may only prove that it is not routinely sending or recording data. It does not prove they can't turn it on whenever they feel like it, or when obeying a time-limited and geofenced mass surveillance order.
Scary. Shouldn't it be encrypted?
Why does this feature change things? Unless it can’t be turned off?
How would you verify?
There is also an approved human list. And the approved humans carry responsibility and consequence when going into the space.
I imagine this is why Apple has kept the mic array and camera as separate removeable components in their devices when pretty much everything else is integrated.
It’s like the cameras in the glasses. If all they said is what _I_ know (“That’s Julie who worked in the same group as you at company Z three years ago. You also ran into her at the grocery store shortly after you quit Z and it was awkward” but not tell me anything about Julie I wouldn’t know, like spouse or where she now works or anything like that”) it would be an excellent prosthesis. Public figures have humans who do this for them.
Unfortunately the glasses makers don’t understand the difference and make it too general and privacy destroying. This Apple thing might be OK in my opinion..but the reality remains to be seen.
I try to explain it is a lot like the subway scenes from Pink Floyd's "The Wall". Everyone has the same distorted indistinguishable face.
Very likely I have lost a lot of "new friends" and business contacts from walking past not recognizing them.
I doubt it and this is the actual problem here with those glasses and now the watch.
I guess they devolve liability onto the user and wash their hands of it?
Argument for, there is no recording stored anywhere thus it does not need consent.
Argument against, there is obviously a recording made. A recording is made and transmitted between devices and Apple and afterwards deleted, that this happens almost real time as the conversation does not change the fact a recording exists for some short time.
Probably Argument for wins, but assume at some point the transcriptions become nearly perfect then expect it to be litigated again.
The term ''interception'' means to secretly hear, secretly record,
or aid another to secretly hear or secretly record the contents of
any wire or oral communication through the use of any intercepting
device by any person other than a person given prior authority by
all parties to such communication.
Oh wait, they are not helping another person to "hear", only to see the words spoken or a summary thereof. Oops, MGL has you there too:
The term ''contents'', when used with respect to any wire or
oral communication, means any information concerning the identity
of the parties to such communication or the existence, contents,
substance, purport, or meaning of that communication.
This may become a case of we don't enforce the laws against large companies.
Why would Apple be a party here at all? Would Sony be a party if someone records another with a walkman?
Apple's marketing screenshots show "Always On - Listen for conversations all day" as one of the four main options when you first turn it on.
I have manually corrected "sale" to "sail" a thousand times post dictation, and Siri doesn't notice, it's "sale" always.
This transcription feature is gonna be a sad joke. This is Apple doubling-down on shit that doesn't work, and has never really worked.
My reasoning so far was that I absolutely didn’t get the use out of it I envisioned and, to my even bigger surprise, the integration between Watch and iPhone wasn’t even that good…
The device microphones are already always listening, this just makes use of that sound a lot more than just listening for “hey siri”.
I have a Casio that has a 10 years battery and dual timezone I need when I travel and a TAG Heuer when I need a "better looking" watch.
I don't need to track steps or trainings. Even when I did it was with stupid gadgets like early fitbit bands without displays.
When I will need something that will alert people when I fall (in many years from now, hopefully) I will use a specialized device.
* You don't need a smartwatch. *
You should have concluded "I don't need a smartwatch."
Not everyone has the same needs.
having a fitness / sleep tracker that i cant wear while i sleep cuz it needs to charge defeats the purpose. doesnt quite fill during a shower.
apple also made it prohibitively cumbersome / confusing to own two devices that boot up to identical instances. why cant i have two pieces of hardware, and whichever one i pick up resumes the session. i dont want them to have two configurations, i want them to mirror each other, if a setting changes on one, it changes on the other.
https://www.swatch.com/en-us/swatch-pay/how-it-works.html
(just the first that comes to my mind, no battery usage)
My smartwatch lasts 10-14 days.
>I don't need notifications on my wrist
I do, as I hate missing the few calls I get, and I love being woken up by a vibration on my wrist instead of a blaring alarm.
I won't address the rest as it's quite subjective, but honestly saying you don’t need a smartwatch is bordering on ragebait.
> Your data is not accessible to Apple either, thanks to Private Cloud Compute, and "independent security experts can verify this promise at any time". Siri Recaps auto-delete after seven days too. Apple is serious about getting users to trust this feature.
Alright. Let say I’m an independent security expert, how could I verify? I can’t, right?
https://help.apple.com/pdf/certifications/en_US/2025-Apple-P...
“Management’s Report of Its Assertions on the Effectiveness of Its Controls over the Private Cloud Compute Provisioning System Based on the Trust Services Criteria for Security, Processing Integrity, and Confidentiality”