A number of years ago, while performing an electronic countermeasures sweep in a Manhattan apartment, our non-linear junction detector (locates hidden electronics) alerted to one Barbie doll that was on display among a few other dolls. To further inspect the Barbie to be sure there was no concealed listening device, we removed her clothes, revealing only that it was a “Talking Barbie” with a circuit that played back pre-recorded phrases. Unfortunately, that was the moment the client came into the room to check on how we were doing. After explaining our peculiar actions, we had a good laugh.
Now though, a “Listening Barbie” (actually named “Hello Barbie”) is coming and this one may be a real threat. This off the shelf, WIFI enabled Barbie records conversations, remembering what it hears, processing it through a cloud server, and enabling it to respond with appropriate comments.
“Eavesdropping Barbie”
While this could sound like fun for a child, it has other, possibly more sinister, repercussions.
“If I had a young child, I would be very concerned that my child’s intimate conversations with her doll were being recorded and analyzed,” Angela Campbell, faculty adviser at Georgetown University’s Center on Privacy and Technology, said in a statement.
Hello Barbie records the voice it hears with an embedded microphone triggered by pressing a button on the doll. As the doll “listens,” audio recordings are transmitted over the Internet to a server where the phrases are recognized and processed. That information is used to help form Hello Barbie’s responses.
Parents can choose to receive daily or weekly e-mails with access to the audio files of their children’s conversations with Hello Barbie. “We want to make sure parents are in control of their family’s data at all times,” said Jacob, ToyTalk’s chief executive.
Mattel and ToyTalk, the San Francisco-based start-up that created the technology used in the doll, say the privacy and security of the technology have been their top priority. “Mattel is committed to safety and security, and Hello Barbie conforms to applicable government standards,” Mattel said in a statement.
Whose to say that caring parents are the only ones signed up for the daily emails?
Compare it with other listening devices such as Amazon Echo, or your new Samsung Smart TV, and the Barbie may be the one to be most wary of.
Privacy advocates are up in arms about this one. We’ll see if it actually makes it to market.
Reminiscent of the voice recording Furbies from the 1990’s that were banned at government sites, such as the NSA and the Pentagon, Hello Barbie may be the next on the unauthorized toy list.