Is My Firestick Listening To Me? (We Checked)

Is your firestick listening to you? There have been many articles about how smart speakers are listening to us when we don’t want them to, and the firestick certainly has the ability to listen to us.

In fact, if you go into the settings of your firestick, you can see that it is able to hear you. But is it? I have noticed that when I turn on my TV with the Firestick, it sometimes picks up a song I say while changing channels.

In this blog, I will explain to you if this is true and why this might happen. 

Here’s If Firestick Is Listening To You:

The Firestick device is designed to listen to your commands, it listens to your voice for a certain keywords and then activates its voice command mode. However, this data or information is only so the device can work properly and is not used for something else.

The Firestick also comes with a voice assistant called Alexa that lets you use your voice to open apps, search for movies or TV shows, and control media playback.

Alexa uses the microphone built into the remote (or an Alexa-enabled speaker) to listen for commands when you press its wake word—usually “Alexa” or “Amazon.”

By default, Alexa records everything it hears after its wake word so that it can interpret your command correctly.

If you don’t want this functionality at all, there are two ways to disable it:

• You can turn off remote microphone usage in Settings > Controllers & Bluetooth Devices > Amazon Fire TV Remote > Microphone: Off
• You can also disable voice input on the Firestick itself by going to Settings > Controllers & Bluetooth Devices > Voice Control: Press Button (formerly Hold Button)

How Can You Check If Your Fire Stick Devices Are Listening?

To check if your Fire Stick devices are listening, you’ll want to open the Alexa app on your device. Once you’re in the app, go to “Settings” and then “Alexa Privacy.” From there, select “Review Voice History.”

This will show you any instances where Alexa has recorded audio from your device(s) that it thought matched a wake word (usually “Alexa” or “Echo”).

While this may be slightly unsettling, remember that Alexa isn’t constantly listening to you.

There is no microphone indicator light.

Rather, it’s only when your voice matches its wake word that audio is recorded and sent back to the cloud for processing—that way Amazon doesn’t have a copy of all conversations in your house and can’t use them against you later (as far as they say), but instead records only what is necessary to perform the task at hand.

How Do I Stop Fire Sticks From Listening?

To turn off voice recording on your Fire Stick, just follow these simple steps:

• Open Alexa on your Fire Stick remote
• Go to Settings
• Select Alexa Privacy
• Select Manage Your Voice Recordings
• Select the “Delete Voice Recordings” option
• To stop the Fire Stick from listening, simply unplug it. If you have an Amazon Echo or other Alexa device, you can also disable the microphone using the button on top of the device.
• Disabling the microphone prevents any voice commands from being processed by your Alexa device until you re-enable the microphone through the same process.

With that said, if you do not have an Amazon Echo but do have a Fire TV, there is a way to stop your Fire Stick from listening.

All you need to do is unplug it. By doing this, you are effectively turning off all of your Alexa devices and preventing them from listening to and recording your conversations.

You can also disable the microphone on your Fire TV by pressing and holding the mute button on your remote control.

This will prevent any voice commands from being processed by your Alexa device until you re-enable the microphone through the same process.

It’s easy to turn off the Fire TV Stick. To do so, simply go to your settings and click on the “Settings” icon. From there, you’ll see a button at the bottom of the page that says “Turn off Amazon Fire TV Stick.” If you have an Android device, you can use the Android app to turn it off.

What Exactly Does Fire Sticks Use These Recordings For?

In their Privacy Policy, Amazon admits that they use recordings to:

• Improve the accuracy of voice search. Since the Fire Stick is a voice-controlled device, it makes sense that Amazon would want to improve how well its microphone picks up and interprets your commands.
• Monitor and test the performance of services. This means using data from Fire Sticks to find ways to make their products better and more efficient for users.
• Develop new services. As Amazon pushes into an increasing number of markets like home security, health care, grocery stores, and more, they’ll likely be relying on insights from their customers’ behavior (including what they say while watching TV).
• Personalize your experience with our services, content or advertising. This allows them to give you recommendations based on your interests—whether those are things you searched for on Fire Sticks or elsewhere online.

Can My Fire Stick Remote Listen To Me?

If you’re wondering if the Fire TV or Fire TV Stick can listen to you and record audio, there’s good news and bad news.

The good news is that these Amazon devices don’t have microphones. The bad news is that your Alexa-enabled Echo devices do have microphones.

How to Check Your Fire TV Device

This is a bit of an advanced tip, but you can check whether your Amazon device has a microphone by going into Settings > Device > Developer Options > Microphone Detection.

If you see an error message that says “Your device has no microphone,” then there’s no need to worry about privacy issues with this device.

Read our other blog about is my Fitbit listening to me?

Can You Use Fire Stick Devices Without Them Snooping On You?

Amazon Fire Stick devices come with Alexa built in. This digital assistant can control everything from smart home gadgets to streaming TV and music apps. However, before you start talking to your Amazon Fire Stick, you might have questions about privacy and security.

Can you use Fire Stick devices without them snooping on you? And if you do use Alexa-enabled features, what information will be stored?

This article answers those questions while also revealing a few tips that can help make your device even more secure and private.

Amazon’s Fire Stick is a pretty fantastic piece of technology; it lets you stream all the movies and TV shows you want, and even access video games. But can you use your Fire Stick without Amazon snooping on everything you’re doing on it?

It’s an important question to ask, because who wants a giant retailer like Amazon tracking what you’re watching on Netflix, or listening in to your Alexa conversations?

The answer is yes—you can use a Fire Stick without being monitored by Amazon. The key is to set up a VPN (short for “virtual private network”) on the device before using any of its apps.

A VPN encrypts your data and makes it virtually impossible for someone else to track what you’re doing online. It’ll keep your information safe, regardless of whether you’re using it to stream movies or just do some online shopping.

Once you’ve installed a VPN on your Fire Stick device, you’ll be able to use it without fear of anyone else monitoring it.

And best of all, setting up a VPN is easier than you might think.

In fact, there are some very good reasons why you might want to consider getting rid of your Fire Stick and finding a better alternative. And here they are:

• The Fire Stick is constantly recording information about what you’re watching and listening to. In other words, everything you do on your TV is being sent to Amazon’s servers in real time. And if that doesn’t make you uncomfortable, it should.
• Your Fire Stick is being used as a spy for Big Brother. It’s no secret that the government is using the Internet to monitor everyone’s activities online. They’re spending billions of dollars every year on programs like PRISM and XKeyscore to gather as much personal data from people as possible.
• The Fire Stick has access to all of your accounts and passwords without your knowledge or approval! If you think this sounds bad, it’s even worse than it seems. Amazon has access to all of your accounts and passwords without your knowledge or approval.

Can Fire Stick Devices Listen When It’s Turned Off?

As the popularity of Fire TV has grown, a common question has come up: can Fire Stick devices listen when it’s turned off? The answer is yes—but with a caveat.

The caveat is that turning off your Fire Stick device doesn’t actually turn it off. Rather, unplugging it or using the remote to select “Turn Off” merely puts it into sleep mode.

This means that even though you see a dark screen, the device is still on and will respond to voice commands if Alexa is enabled.

If you want to completely power down your device, you have to long-press the Select button for about 10 seconds until you see the Power dialog box. (If you’re using an older version of Fire TV, such as one from 2015 or earlier, this feature may not be available.)

Conclusion

For all of their benefits, there are always some drawbacks to any new device and sometimes these drawbacks may not be exactly what the manufacturer of the device intended.

In this case, Fire Stick devices are meant to be easy to use by anyone but some people feel that Amazon is going too far with all the spying.

Sources

• WCPO: Is Amazon Listening?
• Firestick Tricks: Amazon Is Spying On You