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Voice Ethics: Are Virtual Assistants More Helpful than Worrisome?
Siri, Cortana, Alexa and more. Virtual assistants increasingly surround us and respond to questions that we speak. They often can save time, and they can even be spunky and humorous.
But what are some of the ethical and legal challenges that automated voice technology assistants create?
- Privacy – Perhaps the most frequently discussed issue and worry about speakers and virtual assistants is violation of privacy and the potential that devices can record, collect, and surveil information about the user.
- Accountability – When our assistant misinterprets what we say or mistakingly provides us incorrect information, there are unanswered questions about who is at fault?
- Psychological – How does frequent interaction with a machine affect humans psychologically? What happens when both children and adults build emotional attachments to machines?
- Stereotypes – Creators of virtual assistants need to make choices about gender, accent, cadence, and content to anthropomorphize the assistant, but often the selections developers make for these characteristics perpetuate stereotypes.
A survey from Microsoft found that more than half of the people worry that the voice assistants they use are not secure, and one third of the people worry about how their personal information may be collected and used.
Trevor Cox, professor at the University of Salford, wrote for Harvard Business Review, that “in business, we’ve gotten used to being careful about what we write in emails, in case information goes astray. We need to develop a similar wary attitude to having sensitive conversations close to connected devices. The only truly safe device to talk in front of is one that is turned off.”
