A marketing firm that provides services for Facebook, Google, and Amazon has admitted that it uses smartphone microphones to spy on American users’ conversations and customize advertisement choices.
According to 404 Media, Cox Media Group (CMG), which is an American television and radio news conglomerate, recently admitted in a pitch deck to investors that it uses artificial intelligence in its “Active Listening” software to “capture real-time intent data” by listening to smartphone users’ conversations.
CMG said, “Advertisers can pair this voice-data with behavioral data to target in-market consumers.” The company explained that smartphone users “leave a data trail based on their conversations and online behavior” that can be collected and analyzed by artificial intelligence technology.
Last December, 404 Media reported that MindSift, a software company based in New Hampshire, had acknowledged that it also used information collected from cell phone conversations to customize advertisements for users.
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According to The New York Post, after Google was questioned by 404 Media regarding the issue of smartphones spying on users for advertising purposes, the company removed CMG from its “Partners Program” list.
A Google spokesperson told The New York Post, “All advertisers must comply with all applicable laws and regulations as well as our Google Ads policies, and when we identify ads or advertisers that violate these policies, we will take appropriate action.”
The New York Post reported that Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, is currently evaluating its relationship with CMG. A Meta spokesperson told The New York Post, “Meta does not use your phone’s microphone for ads and we’ve been public about this for years. We are reaching out to CMG to get them to clarify that their program is not based on Meta data.”
According to The New York Post, Amazon claimed that it has never used CMG to push advertising objectives and claimed it would terminate ties with any companies that do not follow Amazon’s privacy policies.
