A smart speaker is a type of speaker and voice command device with an integrated virtual assistant that has the capability of recognising and responding to voices, notably a ‘hot word’ or ‘several hot words’ spoken by the user.
Some smart speakers can also act as a smart device that controls other smart home devices, for instance allowing the user to adjust the thermostat with a simple voice command.
Most brands have their own voice recognition technology; Apple has Siri, Amazon has Alexa, etc. Once activated, the speaker listens to your speech, feeds it through the system and responds. The virtual assistant will also learn the more you talk so that it can make better sense of your accent and vocabulary over time and give you better answers.
Privacy concerns
The built-in microphone in smart speakers is continuously listening for "hot words" followed by a command. However, these continuously listening microphones also raise privacy concerns among users. These include what is being recorded, how the data will be used, how it will be protected, and whether it will be used for invasive advertising. Further, an analysis of Amazon Alexa Echo Dots showed that 30–38% of "spurious audio recordings were human conversations", suggesting that these devices capture more audio than they should after detection of the hot word.
