This archive report was first published on 15 July 2019.
Published on July 15, 2019, Google has been under fire for secretly listening to its customers' conversations through its Google Home smart speakers.
According to Google, the company uses language experts to study a small number of audio recordings from users, which amounts to about 0.2% of all recordings.
David Monsees, a Product Manager at Google Search, explained that the study helps the company develop voice recognition and other technology in its Google Assistant artificial intelligence system.
"As part of our work to develop speech technology for more languages, we partner with language experts around the world who understand the nuances and accents of a specific language," Monsees said.
These language experts review and transcribe a small set of queries to help Google better understand those languages, which is a critical part of building speech technology.
