Burger King Runs Ad Triggering Google Home Devices; Google Shuts It Down (theverge.com)

Burger King unveiled a new advertisement earlier today designed to trigger users' Google Home devices. The ad specifically used the Google Home trigger phrase "Okay, Google" to ask "What is the Whopper burger?," thus triggering the Google Assistant to read off the top result from Wikipedia. But less than three hours after Burger King launched the ad, Google disabled the functionality. The Verge reports: As of 2:45PM ET, Google Home will no longer respond when prompted by the specific Burger King commercial that asks "What is the Whopper burger?" It does, however, still respond with the top result from Wikipedia when someone else (i.e., a real user) other than the advertisement asks the same question. Google has likely registered the sound clip from the ad to disable unwanted Home triggers, as it does with its own Google Home commercials.

Comments

Fuck you Google!

[Anonymous Coward]

I wanted to hear more about this "Whopper" burger! What are you trying to hide Google???

Re:Fuck you Google!

[Anonymous Coward]

> What are you trying to hide Google???

Burger King should make a follow up commercial that poses that very question. Make into a conspiracy. The public seems fond of those nowdays.

Re:Fuck you Google!

[Anonymous Coward]

Google probably would re-enable the ad triggering if they would pay them $100 per device that gets triggered.

This is ALL about money.

Re:Fuck you Google!

[Anonymous Coward]

Trump is probably way ahead of you on twitter by now..

Re:Fuck you Google!

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly, they don't want to risk a class action lawsuit. The 100 bucks per device fee could hopefully cover that then some profit.

Re:Fuck you Google!

[martinfb]

Enter the "Google Doouble Deecker" burger...

And I digress from here.

Um

[Anonymous Coward]

I feel like that violates some sort of copyright law. I don't know which one, but I am sure there is one.

Re:Um

[Anonymous Coward]

I feel like that violates some sort of copyright law. I don't know which one, but I am sure there is one.

Of course. Is there anything that doesn't?

Re:Um

[Anonymous Coward]

DMCA is always a good guess.

Re:Um

[Falos]

Several. But they only apply to commoners.

Re: Um

[Anonymous Coward]

Trademark, if anything.

1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't this basically a blatant violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse act? What if a small timer had done this and not a mega corporation?

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

It sure is. We should shut down Google for their computer fraud and abuse in shipping such an insecure, worthless, piece of shit and charging money for it.

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

What if another person in the room with the Google Home owner asked that question without permission? Isn't that a blatant violation of the CFAA?

(No.)

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you likely to use the phrase 'ok google' before asking your friend a random question? No. Not unless you are attempting to trigger his Google home device without permission.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[rogoshen1]

what if he's a pedantic know-it-all-shithead-autist and your affectionate nickname for him is 'google'? Check mate.

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[LesFerg]

Isn't this basically a blatant violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse act? What if a small timer had done this and not a mega corporation?

Essentially it is an act of accessing a computer system belonging to somebody else, without their permission. I imagine the legal description of hacking could be stretched around this well enough to take it to court in a country like the US where litigation rules.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

How about this? Xkcd reference: https://www.xkcd.com/1807/

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[phantomfive]

You're probably right, but I would have responded by linking it to a Big Mac

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[lgw]

Are you likely to use the phrase 'ok google' before asking your friend a random question? No. Not unless you are attempting to trigger his Google home device without permission.

Well, if he's trying to record me with my permission, it seems only fair.
It's just good manners in today's world to shout "Alexa order one ton of cheese; confirm" upon entering a friends house, just to remind him to turn off his microphones around friends.

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not unless visiting a website like slashdot is a blatant violation of that as well.
Websites are completely open to visit unless you you actually protect them.
The same should be true for this. Unless you make some effort to limit it to only accept your voice you accept that anyone can give it commands.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[stealth_finger]

what if he's a pedantic know-it-all-shithead-autist and your affectionate nickname for him is 'google'? Check mate.

Then unless he has the exact same sound profile as the ad, no problem. If your mate happens to be the person from the ad I guess they already know what a whopper is.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[DamonHD]

Oblig: https://xkcd.com/1807/

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[gnasher719]

It's just good manners in today's world to shout "Alexa order one ton of cheese; confirm" upon entering a friends house, just to remind him to turn off his microphones around friends.

It is just good manners to remind you that by doing so, _you_ are legally ordering one ton of cheese, so _you_ are the one paying for it.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Prove it, asshole.

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[geekmux]

Isn't this basically a blatant violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse act? What if a small timer had done this and not a mega corporation?

Essentially it is an act of accessing a computer system belonging to somebody else, without their permission. I imagine the legal description of hacking could be stretched around this well enough to take it to court in a country like the US where litigation rules.

Essentially this is utter stupidity. People want to secure their always-listening devices buried deep in their homes that control every damn thing? Then petition the manufacturer to be able to customize the trigger (pass)word to something other than what the rest of the planet already knows.

And for the latter reason, no, I don't believe even within the idiocy of US litigation could you convince someone that muttering the words "OK Google" is considered hacking. If so, then I fully expect Burger King to be facing terrorist charges for "attacking" the masses

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have three Google Home devices setup to cover the house. But apparently I am the one performing fraud - at least according to broadcasters - because I fast forward the commercials religiously and only watch via TiVo. So none of these advertisers get my eyeballs or the attention of my Amazon Echo devices (2) or Google Home devices (3).

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't believe even within the idiocy of US litigation could you convince someone that muttering the words "OK Google" is considered hacking

You don't have to. If the law were fair, you'd be able to threaten Burger King (a natural person, after all) with 120 years of prison and put pressure on it until it commits suicide.

If the law were just, you wouldn't be able to and Aaron Swartz would still be alive.

Too bad it's neither.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[thewolfkin]

Are you likely to use the phrase 'ok google' before asking your friend a random question? No. Not unless you are attempting to trigger his Google home device without permission.

"Ok google how to find nude pics and tell me I'm wrong"

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[fluffernutter]

I believe this would fall under the category of, "what did you THINK was going to happen?"

It's not even about whether it is legal or not. It's just so easy to happen that it is almost comical to talk about legalities.

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[Chysn]

That was probably their first instinct, too. Unfortunately, they'd then be intentionally providing misinformation to paying customers.

A better approach for sabotage would have been to start reading off nutritional information.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[Ksevio]

The echo doesn't record you unless you say the trigger word.
Also, if you visited anyone sensible the response you'd get is "Please say your PIN to confirm order"

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[Solandri]

Legal consequences will discourage deliberate abuse. But I suspect the technical solution here is to add a direct feed of known non-human audio sources (TV, radio, stereo system) to devices like Google Home or Alexa. That way these devices can selectively ignore from your TV, radio, and stereo system, kinda like how voice chat programs eliminate echo by subtracting the audio they send to the speakers from what they receive from the microphone. It'll prevent blatant abuse of ads to activate these devices. And as an added side benefit, you'll be able to give a voice command in the middle of a loud scene of a movie, and the device will be able to understand you just fine.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[BKDotCom]

The echo doesn't record you unless you say the trigger word.

Don't let facts get in the way of conspiracy / paranoia

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

He'd be facing treason charges and looking at the death penalty.
Legal persons, and the rich and powerful, are allowed to do anything they please.

Laws and harsh punishments are for the proles to remember where they belong.

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[gnick]

But I suspect the technical solution here is to add a direct feed of known non-human audio sources (TV, radio, stereo system) to devices like Google Home or Alexa.

Are you suggesting that we add a bunch of miscellaneous ports to the Home/Echo and wire in every audio source in the house? Or maybe you're picturing small wireless mics next to all those sources to isolate their audio and counter it? I see no obvious, practical way to implement this technical solution. How do you picture this "direct feed of known non-human audio sources" working?

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[lgw]

The echo doesn't record you unless you say the trigger word.

People on Slashhdot used to argue that the NSA couldn't really be recording every phone call in America. Those were innocent days. We know our government has programs to hack smart devices and record everything - that's from leaked documents, not conspiracy theory. Any microphone connected to the internet should be assumed to be recorded somewhere. Sadly, that's just the government we have.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[Ksevio]

Well in theory that's true, but it's pretty easy to monitor the network traffic since it doesn't have a mobile connection or anything.

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's because people want to imagine that their Google device knows their voice like their friend knows their voice.

Some kind of voice print identification.

Then before it does anything really risky, they want to say something like "Authorization Picard Epsilon Seven Nine Three."

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[lgw]

Sure, though depending on the technique used to avoid traffic analysis it might take a while. Would anyone here really be surprised if we hear in a year that security experts are warning that a significant number of IoT/smart devices have been recording us for the past few months?

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

My friend's name is Google you insensitive clod!

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it's not. Freedom of speech buddy. You don't like, then get out of my country.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know why they would think that. I can't think of how many TV shows from the 90's had some situation where an operator is listening for keywords like "bomb". I kinda think I might also have seen that on Get Smart from decades ago.

Re:1984 CFAA violation?

[geekmux]

I believe this would fall under the category of, "what did you THINK was going to happen?" It's not even about whether it is legal or not. It's just so easy to happen that it is almost comical to talk about legalities.

Fortunately, a lack of legal action against Burger King for what would be defined as a distributed/targeted/terrorist attack against thousands of innocent citizens tends to help define precedent.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[beastofburdon]

So true.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[beastofburdon]

I take it you are not aware that for the last several iterations of intel processors there has been a full wireless transmitter/receiver built into the processor.

Gelsinger set a goal to "literally get to the point where radios are integrated into every product we build."

arsTechnica: Intel researchers put WiFi inside... 9/14/2014
I bet you don't get to see everything that happens on those.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[Ksevio]

Well it obviously already has a WiFi connection - a 4G one seems unlikely given the cost

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[beastofburdon]

Specifically, it has a wireless connection that you cannot interact with or monitor traffic on. It even uses a separate core which you also do not have any access to.

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[Ksevio]

But having wireless abilities isn't all that helpful alone. It can't use my wifi so it has to be going through a cell tower which requires a good size antenna

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[robinsc]

Ok google the answer to the question instead of posting it to slashdot willya buddy ?

Re: 1984 CFAA violation?

[robinsc]

Google is officially a verb now you know..

Nice Play

[jwhyche]

I'm glad google shut this down, but I have to admit I'm rather impressed with Burger King on this one. Nicely played.

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

Google should have played back by pushing something like this to the top of the result list, and having Assistant read out the first paragraph from there.

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

this will NOT be the last time someone tries to exploit these stupid so-called "smart" devices, either. at least in this instance it was just a harmless advertisement.

Re:Nice Play

[msauve]

Rather than shut it down, Google should have simply changed the response to something on the order of "The Whopper is a big bunch of tasty calories, but doesn't provide good nutrition. If that's what you want, you should consider a burger from McDonald's, Wendy's, Sonic, or some other brand, which although no better nutritionally, isn't trying to play weird games with its advertising."

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

...although leaving it as Wikipedia would probably have been more effective at warning advertisers off this tactic.

However, prior to the ad's premiere, the article had been modified by a user allegedly tied to the company, so that Google's automatically-generated response to the query would be a detailed description of the Whopper burger that utilized promotional language. The edits were reverted for violating Wikipedia's policies discouraging "shameless self-promotion". Furthermore, the snippet became the target of vandalism, which caused Google Home to read off statements suggesting that the sandwich's ingredients included "rat meat", "toenail clippings", and a "medium-sized child".

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

So you want Google to blatantly editorialize the answers to your questions? Wow.

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

Next ad trick: "Ok Amazon, order me a Samsung 72" big screen TV".

Re:Nice Play

[darthsilun]

from the article: ... its high amount of fat, cholesterol and sodium makes it an unhealthy food...

Well, not to defend Burger King (and a bit off topic), but if you're getting the appropriate amount of exercise your body won't metabolize the fat and cholesterol, and the original research that claimed salt is bad for you was flawed (https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/its-time-to-end-the-war-on-salt/); posting this kind of counter attack could be considered – by some – as misguided. Then again, most people don't get sufficient exercise and the fat and cholesterol is bad for them.

It wasn't uncommon in the early days of the web for people to shift the bandwidth load of their websites by linking to content on other people's web servers. When those other people figured out this was happening to them, they would replace the content with something else that the bandwidth "thief" didn't intend, e.g. smut, much to the bandwidth thief's embarrassment.

A better counter attack, IMO, would have been to replace the content Burger King was expecting with something else, e.g. an audio clip of Meg Ryan's faux orgasm from "When Harry Met Sally" or a clip of HAL saying "I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that."

Re:Nice Play

[cjjjer]

A better reply would be "I'm sorry , I don't understand the question."

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

You a stone cold corporate killa.

Although a Burger King Whopper with cheese gives you an impressive supply of protein, iron and other minerals, its high amount of fat, cholesterol and sodium makes it an unhealthy food that poses a danger to your cardiovascular health. Eating it on a regular basis could easily cause you to gain excess body fat, suffer from blocked arteries and develop high blood pressure.

Re:Nice Play

[CaptainDork]

The real message is that all these people can get into IoT.

Re:Nice Play

[msauve]

A better reply would be "I'm sorry , I don't understand the question."

Why would Google beg to get sued by Apple for copying Siri?

Re:Nice Play

[grep -v '.*' *]

A better counter attack ... would have been to replace the content Burger King was expecting with ... an audio clip of Meg Ryan's faux orgasm from "When Harry Met Sally"

But you do that right AFTER buying a bunch of BK stock. If a Whopper can do that (orgasm, even if fauxed) then who WOULDN'T want one?

Then again, expect to be sued by MAKK (Mothers Against Knowledgeable Kids): Mommy, why is Alexa moaning? Did she eat too many Whoppers and now her stomach hurts? Or does the TV just like to watch?

Re: Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

Google already blatantly editorializes search results, what is one more gonna hirt?

Re: Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

Easy fix - "I'm sorry Laura, I don't understand the question". Apple may be sue-happy, but Channel 4 are far less so.

Re:Nice Play

[meglon]

See, now if it was Wendy's that came up with the add, the better response would have been "I'm sorry Dave, i can't do that."

Re:Nice Play

[stealth_finger]

So you want Google to blatantly editorialize the answers to your questions? Wow.

If you want better results search yourself you lazy turd and don't rely on the top result.

Re:Nice Play

[stealth_finger]

A better reply would be "I'm sorry , I don't understand the question."

Why would Google beg to get sued by Apple for copying Siri?

Do apple have a patent on not understanding things now? Or do people think every fucking word they type can never be used again in that order?

Re:Nice Play

[elgatozorbas]

A better counter attack, IMO, would have been to replace the content Burger King was expecting with something else, e.g. an audio clip of Meg Ryan's faux orgasm from "When Harry Met Sally"

Note that that clip ended in a woman saying "I'm having what she is having". Don't think BK would object.

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

Not that impressive. I bet they got their idea from XKCD https://xkcd.com/1807/

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

A better reply would be "I'm sorry , I don't understand the question."

Why would Google beg to get sued by Apple for copying Siri?

As opposed to getting sued by the Trump administration for acting like they understood the question and then making some racist comment taken straight from Breitbart?

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/donald-trump-barack-obama-coup-google-home-assistant-question-fake-news-a7614421.html

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

"Congratulations on winning an oscar, do you have a speech?"

"OK Google search child pornography"

Re:Nice Play

[drinkypoo]

Rather than shut it down, Google should have simply changed the response to something on the order of

...legally actionable libel.

Do you people think before you post these comments? Wait, I forgot, this is Slashdot. I must be new here.

Absolutely the only thing Google can get away with legally is simply ignoring the trigger. Otherwise they'll be illegally abusing their market position.

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

A couple years ago an Xbox player had the name handle of "XboxShutdown". I watched a video of him playing and as people saw his name and made a comment they were removed from the game as their Xbox shutdown. Trolling at top levels there.

So this is a pretty old trick, but starting to become more common.

Re:Nice Play

[msauve]

Is that you Sheldon? Your sarcasm detector isn't working well today.

Re:Nice Play

[drinkypoo]

Is that you Sheldon? Your sarcasm detector isn't working well today.

Before you expect people to laugh, check to be sure that you are in fact funny.

Re: Nice Play

[dnaumov]

"Nicely played" as in "committed a felony"?

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

When those other people figured out this was happening to them, they would replace the content with something else that the bandwidth "thief" didn't intend, e.g. smut, much to the bandwidth thief's embarrassment.

So no shit, there I was, looking at awstats, and noticed a huge amount of hits from MySpace to a picture of Erin Esurance I had on my blog at some point, mostly touting the virtues of Esurance probably being shit, but really fucking cheap.

Some dude posted to this chick's myspace comments that she looked like Erin Esurance, in a complimentary fashion.

I replaced the image with the most godawful looking picture of Steve Tyler I could find.

Lulz were had.

Re:Nice Play

[donaggie03]

Rather than shut it down, Google should have simply changed the response to something on the order of

...legally actionable libel.

Do you people think before you post these comments? Wait, I forgot, this is Slashdot. I must be new here.

Absolutely the only thing Google can get away with legally is simply ignoring the trigger. Otherwise they'll be illegally abusing their market position.

So is it libel or is it abusing market position? A reasonable belief that a statement is true is usually good enough to shut down a libel case, and that seems likely here. Google is not in the fast food business, so it's dominant position in the computer/web-ad market is irrelevant. You can only abuse your market position in the market you operate in. Did you even think before you posted your comment?

Re: Nice Play

[jwhyche]

No felonies where committed. What was done was a pretty good hack if you think about it. Burger King managed to hack a device over a TV commercial. That was actually very clever.

I'm glad google shut this down because there probably would have been copy cats. But again, no felonies where committed.

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait, I'm confused. Which statements of fact in his comment were false or misleading in a defamatory way? Are you suggesting that the Whopper is in fact not big or tasty, or that it does actually provide good nutrition (define 'good')?

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

The reason more people don't pull this move is not because it's clever, it's because it's unethical. There are many people who confuse cleverness with immorality, you're one of them.

Re:Nice Play

[Falos]

"pressure cooker bomb" might be hotter but I'm honestly not sure

Re:Nice Play

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why we need this setting:
Language: English (Yoda)

Re:Nice Play

[OhPlz]

Ethics and advertising have never coexisted.

Found the LUDDITE!

[Anonymous Coward]

ONLY apps can app apps, and Apper King was simply trying to app apps while apping other apps! LUDDITE Google is too stupid to figure out how to app the app, so they used LUDDITE hackers to shut it down!

Apps!

Re:Found the LUDDITE!

[Anonymous Coward]

welcome back old friend

Re:Found the LUDDITE!

[ferret4]

Hooray, Apps!

Re:Found the LUDDITE!

[DontBeAMoran]

Now if only we could have a 3D-printed drone running apps to filter queries via a hosts file, we'd have a winning post.

Re:Found the LUDDITE!

[Neuronwelder]

Will they print a 3D edible version of the hamburger??

Re:Found the LUDDITE!

[Cro Magnon]

It shouldn't be hard to print a 3D burger that tastes better than the real thing.

Re:Found the LUDDITE!

[Neuronwelder]

LOL!

CueCat all over again

[Red_Chaos1]

The company that made the CueCat wanted to be able to do just this eventually. When I worked at Radio Shack in the early 00's we gave these stupid things away. Information coming down the pipeline said they eventually intended to make a device that connected to the PC and would respond to audio cues in advertisement on TV and open a browser to the product page. At the time it sounded retarded, like, "who the fuck would want such a thing?" Laugh's on me I guess, everyone wants an Echo or Home now.

Re:CueCat all over again

[93 Escort Wagon]

Laugh's on me I guess, everyone wants an Echo or Home now.

"Everyone wants an Echo" isn't the same thing as "Everyone wants a device that can be manipulated by an advertisement in a movie, TV show, or web video".

Disclaimer: I have no desire to purchase either an Echo or a Home - I just don't see any significant advantage to owning them, while I do see a lot of potential disadvantages.

Re:CueCat all over again

[gfxguy]

Yeah.... I'm not going to belittle people who want that shit... but I don't want that shit.

Re:CueCat all over again

[Anonymous Coward]

We have a lot of "smart stuff" in our home and most of it can be voice controlled with an iPhone after holding the home button. The idea of a device that is always listening is still retarded.

Re:CueCat all over again

[Anonymous Coward]

Right - I am waiting for the news stories to start showing up about how "hackers" (including government snoops from all across the planet) activate Echo and GHome to eavesdrop on unsuspecting users, both targeted for specific reasons, and "just because..." as is happening with various IoT devices already.

Re:CueCat all over again

[rtb61]

You kind of should belittle people who want that shit it it's current state, in opposition to the marketing that tells them they are special if they buy that shit. Counter marketing is fair and reasonable in today's market place. Purposeful hacking by Burger King, well, technically it is a computer crime, although the bar for security is exceedingly low, they still did intentionally hack and abuse a computer network, that network being between the consumer and Google, this done in order to steal advertisement time worth millions of dollars. So really quite naughty and a criminal offence, technically.

Re:CueCat all over again

[mrchaotica]

I remember grabbing one of those because it was a free hackable barcode scanner, but I never got around to actually doing anything with it. I'm pretty sure I still have it in the bottom of a drawer somewhere.

Re:CueCat all over again

[mrchaotica]

You kind of should belittle people who want that shit it it's current state, in opposition to the marketing that tells them they are special if they buy that shit. Counter marketing is fair and reasonable in today's market place.

I would go further: I would say that anyone who understands the severe harm to both privacy and free speech that these things cause almost has a moral obligation to educate potential victims about that harm, whenever possible.

Re:CueCat all over again

[alzoron]

They were pretty handy at the school I worked at. Getting new equipment was a red tape nightmare and we needed some more barcode scanners in the library. Hooray for CueCat.

Re: CueCat all over again

[Anonymous Coward]

Just to play devils advocate. Speaking as to why the Amazon Dot is a very good product (the Echo is over priced by a long way, so I do not recommend them. The Dots can be had on sale for $35.), it must be said that you have to have a smart home.

If you have smart lights, like Philips Hue, smart plugs, like iDevices, a smart lock, like the August Lock, a smart thermostat, like the Nest, and a universal remote, like the Logitech Harmony Elite you can control your whole home via Alexa.

Stick a Dot in every room and you can pause the tv from the bathroom. You can say, "Alexa, goodnight," and all the lights turn off, the tv turns off, any electronics turn off, the AC adjusts, and Alexa makes sure the doors are locked and reports their state. You can say, "Alexa, I'm leaving," and trigger the same thing, only your front door locks behind you. While watching tv, you can use Alexa to pause, play, skip forward/backward, and change the volume, etc... no more hunting down the remote if it's not handy. With Alexa, you can control anything the Logitech Harmony Elite can control. So, anything with IR and many WIFI controlled devices.

You can have home presets, where you can say, "Alexa, it's party time," and all the Hue lights set their colors and brightness, the AC turns adjusts, party music fills the house, and all the TV's in the house turn on and tune in various sports channels.

Once you can trigger events across your home with your voice and not just turn on a light, you just can't go back.

Not to mention, using Skills and IFTTT, you can have reminders sync to iOS or Android reminders. You can have your shopping list synced to your grocery list app on your phone, you can check your iOS or google calendar, you can ask Alexa if you need a coat or a umbrella. You can set timers and ask for measurement conversions in the kitchen, etc...

If you have Audible, you can just ask Alexa to start playing your book.

If you have Amazon Prime, then you get Amazon Music. So, in our master bath, under the vanity, is an echo. So, you can walk into the shower and say, "Alexa, play some music," or "Alexa, play the podcast Mohr Stories, with Jay Mohr," or you can ask for a news flash and get your morning briefing.

Having a full featured smart home is like caller ID was back in the day. At first, it was an expensive add-on. It didn't seem super useful, so we didn't get it. As soon as it became part of the basic Southern Bell package, it quickly became something that now, I just don't see how we lived without it.

Re: CueCat all over again

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow. A smart home sounds like an awful lot of money for very little benefit. I honestly never cared for all the gimmicky stuff individually, and thought perhaps the synergy of it all would add up to something more, but... literally everything you described, I have alternatives for that don't require a smart house.

I have a programmable thermostat -- very versatile, and no need for a Nest. I have friends with a Nest... and they aren't all that impressed with it even after months of training it. I have an android tablet with blutooth speakers, so I can get 90% of the voice activated features you listed just by... carrying it around with me. Smart plugs don't excite me -- they didn't even back when they operated on "the clapper." I have a remote for a power strip for a room with no overhead light, and it suits me fine. The smart lock is interesting, but I'm wary of an IoT device that also has wireless keys as I know thieves copy wireless car signals to pop trunks and open garage doors. I have an alarm system, and it tells me whether or not all the doors and windows are shut (though not whether they're locked!) The Phillips Hue bulbs... it's a nice gimmick to sell LED bulbs for 3 to 5 times the price of their competitors to sync with IoT or TV shows, but... I just don't see the appeal. Perhaps if I had a basement theater room like another family member had, I could install the fancy bulbs for a more engrossing experience. As for TVs and remotes... The Harmony is an excellent remote -- but, I have no need for it... b/c I don't watch TV on cable anymore... not directly anyway. My TVs are basically monitors for laptops which display streaming media -- including Charter's Spectrum web streaming for my cable service. So, there's no need to flip channels, it's just point and click & I can use the app on my tablet to switch channels on my boxes or set the DVR anyway.

I'm sure smart homes are the future, but I see a better version down the line that makes the current IoT setup look like child's play. And, just fyi, every device you add to a wireless network degrades the quality of the network for all other devices within range with overlapping frequencies b/c for most wifi setups, only one device can truly talk at a time, and when two or more talk at once, they both shut up and then re-broadcast at a new random interval. So, IoT with dozens of wifi connections... really crappy wireless network quality.

I'll wait 'til we have personal AI that isn't cloud-based, but home-based and has privacy protections and my interests at heart rather than the company that sold it to me... and wired network connections wherever possible!

Re: CueCat all over again

[Anonymous Coward]

The time it takes you to ask a question and get Dot to process and act on it is generally longer than the time it takes you to get off your butt and do it yourself. Given that none of these devices use Speaker Identification I'm not inclined to hand the keys to my house to any person that can shout in the window or play an ad on television. Even LCARS wouldn't respond to most questions until the speaker had identified themselves and that was thought about over 30 years ago.

Re: CueCat all over again

[vux984]

You can say, "Alexa, goodnight," and all the lights turn off, the tv turns off, any electronics turn off, the AC adjusts, and Alexa makes sure the doors are locked and reports their state.

And then you change your wifi password and spend 3 days chasing down random things you forgot about.

Then the over priced door lock breaks, and you don't even notice for 3 months. It mean... it says it was locking and unlockng but the bolt wasn't moving.

Then some sensor flakes out and turns your heat off. And worse, you turn it on manually... and then it promptly gets signaled to turn off a few seconds later. And your not home... and your wife has to unplug the nest to stop it from shutting the heat off until you can get home to figure out what is wrong.

Meanwhile the asshole kids next door figured out how to take remote control of your smart TV...

While watching tv, you can use Alexa to pause, play, skip forward/backward, and change the volume, etc.

Unless you turn it up to high by accident and Alexa can't hear you telling it to turn it back down.

You can have home presets, where you can say, "Alexa, it's party time," and all the Hue lights set their colors and brightness, the AC turns adjusts, party music fills the house, and all the TV's in the house turn on and tune in various sports channels.

And then your son storms upstairs pissed that you screwed up his guild raid with your bullshit ... again.

With Alexa, you can control anything the Logitech Harmony Elite can control. So, anything with IR and many WIFI controlled devices.

Yeah, I have one of those. I love it. But its also pretty fallible. It'll end up on the wrong TV input, it'll get its states mixed up 'toggle power' on the wrong thing or put the HTPC which was awake to sleep when i select it. No big deal, tap tap tap... problem fixed. I really don't want to talk to it... or have 3 people in the room all trying to fix it by issuing voice commands.

Once you can trigger events across your home with your voice and not just turn on a light, you just can't go back.

Yeah, lets come back to this one.

You can have home presets, where you can say, "Alexa, it's party time," and all the Hue lights set their colors and brightness, the AC turns adjusts, party music fills the house, and all the TV's in the house turn on and tune in various sports channels.

I pretty much guarantee you that you spent more time setting that mode up, then I'd ever get back using it.

And THAT is where home automation is at. Its a great toy for the person who WANTS to play with it; who enjoys spending hours setting up programs they'll only use twice. Who enjoys debugging all the glitches. Who's ok when a power surge blows $500 worth of smart light bulbs. Who doesn't mind doing a firmware upgrade on his front door lock.

But for the average person, no, its not like caller id. Caller id is simple and just works. And when it fails, it just says unknown number and you have to pick up the call to find out who it is or let it go to voice mail. Home automation is a rube-goldberg machine that is a lot of fun if you like building and maintaining rube goldberg machines -- but its not practical and it frequently fails in pretty spectacular ways.

Re:CueCat all over again

[dargaud]

I still think "why would anyone want something like that?" and don't understand the alleged success of the Eco / Home. I say alleged because I don't know anyone with one nor many people aware of them. But one thing for sure, next time I'm on the radio I'm going to yell "OK Google, order a barrel of lube and a dildo. Confirm."

Re:CueCat all over again

[houghi]

So really quite naughty and a criminal offence, technically.

Although nice as a discussion point, it really doesn't matter as they are a big company. That makes it legal by default, unless another big company disagrees.

Re:CueCat all over again

[drinkypoo]

I remember grabbing one of those because it was a free hackable barcode scanner, but I never got around to actually doing anything with it. I'm pretty sure I still have it in the bottom of a drawer somewhere.

This is not about the cuecat barcode reader, but about the... I don't know, I forget what they called it, but it was just an audio cable which ran from your TV to your PC. And your PC would run some program which would listen to the audio out from your TV, and when it detected certain cadences it would load data from the audio stream and display an ad on your PC. I got one because it was a free long mono audio cable. Maybe with a pass through RCA on both ends. I may still have it, too, if I haven't carved it up for some other purpose. I will probably finally use it soon, more than a decade later, for a backup camera install in a T1N sprinter.

Re: CueCat all over again

[Anonymous Coward]

With Alexa, you can control anything the Logitech Harmony Elite can control. So, anything with IR and many WIFI controlled devices.

Yeah, I have one of those. I love it. But its also pretty fallible. It'll end up on the wrong TV input, it'll get its states mixed up 'toggle power' on the wrong thing or put the HTPC which was awake to sleep when i select it. No big deal, tap tap tap... problem fixed. I really don't want to talk to it... or have 3 people in the room all trying to fix it by issuing voice commands.

My dad had one of those remotes, damn thing never worked right so after a while the rest of us ignored it and continued to use the various remotes that came with the devices because they always just worked. Multi-function remotes are still as crap as they've always been.

Re: CueCat all over again

[apoc.famine]

I pretty much guarantee you that you spent more time setting that mode up, then I'd ever get back using it.

I'm about break-even on my Hue bulbs. It took awhile to set them up to mimic a sunrise in the morning, and a sunset in the evening. Living decently far north, I find it's really helpful during the winter to have a stable sunrise and sunset despite the darkness outside. I've had the same settings for 2-3 years now, and it's really, really nice. I wake before my alarm most mornings, and as the house "sunsets", it triggers me to go to bed at the same time every night.
 
But some time ago they released an "improved" Hue app, and while it's much simpler to use, I don't see a way to recreate what I spent a lot of time setting up. I ended up having to revert to the old one and fix a bunch of lost settings. That was a definite time-sink. And that's even with disallowing my IoT light system to access the broader internet. It's isolated on my network, and I just let one phone update its app.
 
And that's the other problem with IoT things - even when you have them set the way you want them, there's no guarantee that the company that you're relying on to allow you to manage them will keep them in the same state. Cue the time-sink and tinkering, to try to get what you want out of them.
 
The bulbs I bought and programmed were for a distinct need, and they fill that need. I have yet to find anything else in the IoT that falls into that category.

Re:CueCat all over again

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe the company eventually wanted to make an audio device, but for those who don't remember, the CueCat given away by RadioShack was a barcode scanner, not an audio device.

Re: CueCat all over again

[djrobxx]

Caller id is simple and just works. And when it fails, it just says unknown number and you have to pick up the call to find out who it is or let it go to voice mail. Home automation is a rube-goldberg machine that is a lot of fun if you like building and maintaining rube goldberg machines -- but its not practical and it frequently fails in pretty spectacular ways.

I've had a Z-wave HA system going for around 8 years. It is like caller ID - if the controller fails, I revert to using the wall switches. Z-wave can be a bit finicky to set up initially but the only real failure modes I've had are dead switches, which I've had actually more of with my bath fan timers that are not part of the HA system. I've had zero problems with door locks. They're great not because I can "unlock it with my phone", but because it makes managing the entry codes easy (example: give a temporary code to a contractor), and because they can alert you when someone punches in a code.

I will say having lighting control is on the overrated side. I find that's mostly only valuable when switches aren't convenient to reach. The one I use most often is the back patio light, because I generally don't notice I've left it on until I'm upstairs and about ready to go to bed, and the dog has finally settled down, etc.

HA made my in-ground hot tub experience a whole lot better. There's a filter pump, a heater, and light, and a water filler valve. The controls for all of these things were in separate and very hard to reach places, and the old mechanical timer used to "conflict" with the heater when I wanted to heat it during its normal filter schedule. Now they're all lined up on one page on my smartphone. And now that I've connected my system to HomeKit via HomeBridge, I can even ask Siri to turn the light on hands free if I'm in the tub and it gets dark out.

I haven't seen a "spectacular" HA failure since the old X10 days, when noise in your power line might trigger every HA-connected light switch to turn on. :)

Re: CueCat all over again

[Ksevio]

Most home automation devices are paired with a hub, not directly over wifi. The main use of my echo is to turn on/off lights (sometimes to get weather or train times). It was very easy to set up - pretty much simple and just worked. If for some reason the hub died, the light switches will work.

Also, for my lock at least, there's an independent sensor that detects if the door is locked

Re: CueCat all over again

[mrchaotica]

You missed the two biggest issues:

First, half of this shit ships with backdoors from the factory and the other half gets hacked five seconds after plugging it in, which means that not only will you be contributing to a botnet, the device logs (from which your home/away schedule could be deduced) and the recordings of everything you say would be available to every criminal on the Internet.

Second, all of this shit is explicitly designed to make those logs and recordings available for companies to analyze your habits and market even more shit to you (which is more than bad enough by itself), and will eventually get cross-referenced with all the other data being collected about you to form an Orwellian dystopia of constant surveillance (which is even worse).

Re: CueCat all over again

[vux984]

Yup. I missed those although i alluded a bit to them getting hacked.

I also missed that obsolescence angle... that the door lock in a house built in 1950 still works fine, but your new IoT lock probably won't be compatible with the next generation or 3's 'hub' (within 5-10 years), the old app that came with the old hub won't work your new phone... the app that works with your new phone won't work with old hub; the old hub and the new hub won't work with eachother... etc etc etc...

Re: CueCat all over again

[Anonymous Coward]

> And then you change your wifi password and spend 3 days chasing down random things you forgot about.

This is why you use WPA2-Enterprise everywhere you can (so you have per-device passwords (which makes setting up guest access trivial)), and begrudgingly use WPA2-Personal for things such as Chromecasts and Nest thermometers that are behind the times.

And besides, every WiFi-equipped router made in the past ten years gives you a list of devices currently connected. Look at that list to remind yourself of devices you may have forgotten.

Re:CueCat all over again

[Anonymous Coward]

... everyone wants an Echo or Home now.

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

Shouldn't the title read....

[thegrassyknowl]

... "Malicious attackers in Burger King's advertising department use vulnerability in Google home to make it do stuff its owner didn't request".

It's a bit rich to call it an ad and chuckle about.

It's a lot scary that it's possible for a remote attacker to ask these devices en masse to do something with nothing more than a broadcast ad. For now it was reading a wikipedia page. What happens when scumvertisers and other malicious adversaries figure out a way to make it spend money without your consent? Or to report to them that you have heard the ad, or worse.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[The MAZZTer]

Google can already do strict voice recognition, so I expect in the near future newer devices will have this enabled all the time by default to prevent things like this... also, so they can tie queries to specific people for data mining purposes, of course.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[Trogre]

It's a bit rich to call it an ad and chuckle about.

No, that's exactly what it is.

It's a lot scary that it's possible for a remote attacker to ask these devices en masse to do something with nothing more than a broadcast ad. For now it was reading a wikipedia page. What happens when scumvertisers and other malicious adversaries figure out a way to make it spend money without your consent? Or to report to them that you have heard the ad, or worse.

It's not scary at all.

That risk already exists, is absurdly obvious, and has been made VERY clear on both tech forums and mainstream media. Anyone with ANY clue about phone security, and this includes people who lock their phone, has already disabled the voice feature so it isn't an issue for them.

It's about as scary as the thought that if you leave your house front door open someone could just walk in.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[thegrassyknowl]

No, that's exactly what it is.

No, it's intentional, premeditated unauthorized use of a computer of computing device. You can bet the farm that nobody authorized Burger King to assume control of their Google device and cause it to access the Internet. That it was in the form of a broadcast advertisement for a large corporation doesn't make it any less heinous to my mind.

That risk already exists, is absurdly obvious, and has been made VERY clear on both tech forums and mainstream media. Anyone with ANY clue about phone security, and this includes people who lock their phone, has already disabled the voice feature so it isn't an issue for them.

Anyone with any clue about security already avoids these things. Many with no clue about security are buying them up for the shiny factor. It is scary because the sort of people who don't have a clue are the sort of people buying them. Even people who care about security are buying and using voice activated devices.

It's about as scary as the thought that if you leave your house front door open someone could just walk in.

The average person understands that risk quite well. They might not assess its severity correctly, but they understand it. The average person does not understand the risk of these smart devices, and they remain wilfully ignorant when more knowledgable individuals try to educate them. Now we have a set of devices that can potentially be turned into a bot net en masse just by a radio or tv broadcast and the usual owner of such a device doesn't have a clue that it's even possible. Hell, they could take all the right precautions (firewall, apply updates, isolated segments, etc) and still be had. This (https://arstechnica.com/security/2017/03/smart-tv-hack-embeds-attack-code-into-broadcast-signal-no-access-required/) kind of attack springs to mind.

It's scary because Burger King will probably get away with this, paving the way for other corporates to try on the same shit.

It's scary because "OK Google" isn't necessarily the only trigger word. The attacker only needs to convince the trigger algorithm. If they discover a sound or sounds that are innocuous but trigger it then they can trigger devices without being obvious about it.

It's scary because these devices have reached a critical mass large enough that a corporation took notice and exploited them.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[Anonymous Coward]

Any technology that requires all users to know how to access arcane options to disable easily abused features is a failure of design. People learn to lock their doors because the doors and locks have blindly obvious purposes that everyone learns how to use as children. The entire purpose of audio recognition features is to hide the locks by default and make them hard to engage because convenience is somehow more important than security.

I'm not sure I disagree with any one specific point in your post, but rather with your overall attitude that "I know how to protect myself, so it's not a problem" is just not going to make these problems go away. Also, if you think your life will not be affected by these issues because you are so smart, well, maybe you aren't so smart. There have been many recent DDOS occurrences that I'm sure have inconvenienced you in some way, and all signs point to this getting much worse before getting better.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a bit rich to call it an ad and chuckle about.

No, that's exactly what it is.

Not only that, but it's advertising being used to pole fun at Google, who are of course the biggest advertising company on the planet.

Something something poetic justice...

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[lgw]

ou can bet the farm that nobody authorized Burger King to assume control of their Google device and cause it to access the Internet.

Every single person who installed one of these listening devices authorized every random stranger with a voice to command it to do any damn thing they wanted because that's how the device works. You've made it clear anyone is welcome to control your home by installing it in the first place!

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[gnasher719]

Every single person who installed one of these listening devices authorized every random stranger with a voice to command it to do any damn thing they wanted because that's how the device works. You've made it clear anyone is welcome to control your home by installing it in the first place

Sounds like an autistic nerd who cannot distinguish between the ability to do something and the authorisation to do something.

Re: Shouldn't the title read....

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course it records everything and parses it for marketing data. You fucking idiot, that's the whole point of these things.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[thegarbz]

It's scary because Burger King will probably get away with this, paving the way for other corporates to try on the same shit.

Legally this is unlikely. The first case of this was a cute example of using something in the house to extend the advertisement. Now that the example is out the company has already put effort into preventing it happening again. This makes any future such advertisement a direct attack against efforts from another company to limit it and completely changes what was at first cute to an actual arms race that will eventually find its way into the courts.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[AmiMoJo]

Google is already working on being able to distinguish people by their voices, so that they can support multiple users. One of the big limitations on current voice assistants is that they are single user, and it's not like you can just have one each right next to each other in a multi-user household, and there are privacy issues...

To be frank they should have launched with such basic features in place.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[Mordaximus]

It's scary because "OK Google" isn't necessarily the only trigger word. The attacker only needs to convince the trigger algorithm. If they discover a sound or sounds that are innocuous but trigger it then they can trigger devices without being obvious about it.

I feel the solution is to fingerprint each voice that says OK Google. If the voice is not recognized, or if the device has been rebooted or even if a certain amount of time has passed, the device should ask the user to supply their passphrase before proceeding. All of these things should be stored and processed locally.

That would effectively stop this form of attack, while giving me the opportunity to finally unlock a device with "Solent Green is People"

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[drinkypoo]

I feel the solution is to fingerprint each voice that says OK Google. If the voice is not recognized, or if the device has been rebooted or even if a certain amount of time has passed, the device should ask the user to supply their passphrase before proceeding. All of these things should be stored and processed locally.

An attack like this can be defeated even without that, since the device phones home on every activation. If the same voice print is saying "Ok, Google" in multiple locations, you just disallow all but the first one. And if a new one comes in before the "user" could reasonably have gotten there (based on the locations of the devices) then you not only ignore it, but flag the voice as belonging to a malicious actor.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[geekmux]

... "Malicious attackers in Burger King's advertising department use vulnerability in Google home to make it do stuff its owner didn't request".

It's a bit rich to call it an ad and chuckle about.

It's a lot scary that it's possible for a remote attacker to ask these devices en masse to do something with nothing more than a broadcast ad. For now it was reading a wikipedia page. What happens when scumvertisers and other malicious adversaries figure out a way to make it spend money without your consent? Or to report to them that you have heard the ad, or worse.

If you're stupid enough to allow a device to "spend money" secured with nothing more than a passphrase known to the entire planet, then you probably get what you deserve.

We've always had a problem with hacking due to poor passwords that people chose. Naturally the obvious answer was to ensure everyone using these devices has the same fucking password. Brilliant stupidity at it's finest.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[R3d M3rcury]

It's a lot scary that it's possible for a remote attacker to ask these devices en masse to do something with nothing more than a broadcast ad.

Alexa, kill all humans.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[Anonymous Coward]

"To be frank they should have launched with such basic features in place."
Actually, if I had one with that feature it would be time to add a voice disguiser circuit.

Re:Shouldn't the title read....

[robinsc]

In this case it is essential that the owner of the system take all possible precautions not to provide open access which is why there are disclaimers on every login banner on commercial servers. If the owner of the device has an option to enforce strict voice recognition but does not do so they are liable . It is like leaving your wifi unprotected and them having a random terrorist send death threat from your home wifi. You will be found negligent and hence culpable and you will not be able to prosecute anyone using your unsecured resources. Onus is on you to prove you did not leave your devices unprotected to allow burger king to incorporate it in their advertising. Google should allow incorporation of a passphrase along with strict voice recognition.

Next ad will target Alexa

[Anonymous Coward]

Obligatory etc.

Re:Next ad will target Alexa

[mrchaotica]

I see your XKCD and raise you Dilbert.

Re:Next ad will target Alexa

[subanark]

I see your static media and raise you an animated Dilbert: https://youtu.be/7MqhBL9eEts?t...

Re:Next ad will target Alexa

[Anonymous Coward]

Perfect!

Re:Next ad will target Alexa

[mrchaotica]

I fold.

Re:Next ad will target Alexa

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll see your XKCD and Dilbert and raise you an 2014 Heise.de/ct

https://www.heise.de/ct/ausgabe/2014-19-Schlagseite-2295688.html

What questions does Google Home not respond to

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm, I wonder what other questions Google Home has been programmed to ignore?

If some Slashdotter has one, could you ask it?

I see a song...

[Anonymous Coward]

How many different voices saying phrases starting with "Okay Google" can you fit in a 3 minute pop song?

Copyright?

[Anonymous Coward]

And now Burger King could probably try to sue them for copyright breach as you can bet the way they did it was to rip the sample from the ad.

AI might fix this

[Anonymous Coward]

Pretty sure bet a neural net could be trained to tell the difference between real people and mostly any device.

Re: AI might fix this

[Anonymous Coward]

Cloud based neural nets can surely synergisticly cloudify any problem.

Re:AI might fix this

[HiThere]

You're probably correct, but they'd have huge numbers of both false positives and false negatives, and they'd use whopping amounts of CPU time and RAM. Not a good answer.

1807

[RyoShin]

Relevant xkcd

Re:1807

[Anonymous Coward]

Relevant Dilbert strip from 23 years ago...
http://dilbert.com/strip/1994-04-24

Crowdfund?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can we crowdfund some radio advertising and broadcast a few messages to GHomes of our choosing? Any suggestions?

Updates...

[Anonymous Coward]

What stops them from using a subchannel to give it updates and more commands without anyone hearing it?

Creepy.

Fridge Horror

[locoluis]

1. Record someone's voice without permission.
2. Build custom TTS.
3. Use your victim's voice to give orders to other IoT devices.
4. ???
5. Profit!

Re:Fridge Horror

[Imrik]

4. Buy things from yourself in your victim's name.

Re:Fridge Horror

[m.alessandrini]

"My voice is my passport. Verify me."

"What is the Whopper burger?"

[Anonymous Coward]

Mystery ground up animal carcasses mixed with gluten "enriched" wheat, plus lots of toxins you don't need nor want.

Science Bitch

[Anonymous Coward]

"Xbox On"

Movie Theater Silent

[Anonymous Coward]

Now if they could just get this to work in the movies to silent phones...

Google search is an indispensable Cell phone tool

[Trax3001BBS]

For me. Quick and on the money. I have tested it to see if it will open when asleep - Nope.

This AD is a cheap trick, yet shows the risk of using Google home or any other device of it's nature.

A Whopper is a lie

[innocent_white_lamb]

Whopper is defined as "a gross or blatant lie."

Why the google doodad would talk about hamburgers when asked to define a straightforward word in relatively common use is beyond my understanding. Had they provided a correct answer (and not a hamburger advertisement) this would not have been an issue.

Re:A Whopper is a lie

[Anonymous Coward]

"Whopper burger", not just "Whopper".

Re:A Whopper is a lie

[phantomfive]

Because the internet has been overtaken by brands.

At one time, not long ago, if you did a search for "Fortune" Google would return links for the BSD fortune program.
Now it returns links to Fortune magazine. SEO changed the internet to a model of whoever can push stuff hardest in your face, and Burger King won here.

Asking for it

[Anonymous Coward]

Any device that responds to this is stupid any way.
What if this wasn't an ad, but a movie where when one the characters does this?
Would they ban that movie?
Either fix your shit so it isn't triggered by the tv saying shit, or get rid of voice activation.

A great demonstration

[GeekWithAKnife]

Of why it's an awful idea to force all devices to listen out for the same fucking activation line. Some with "always on listening".


Will google now wake-up and let us train the assistant to trigger at whatever we want? -later matching it only to our voice so it's less likely to activate even if someone knows what we say to activate it.

I like the phrase; *white noise breathing* "Luke, this is your father." -let's use that.

Re:A great demonstration

[Baron_Yam]

I'd rather give the assistant a name and *mostly* have it answer only when my voice addresses it.

It would probably be useful to have security settings that would allow others to run some searches. We're working towards a 'Jarvis' interface, right? If it just talks to me, that's actually rather limiting.

Marketeers

[mwvdlee]

On the scale of humanity there's normal people, sociopaths, psychopaths, then a large gap, then finally marketeers.

The REAL problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Is wtf are we issuing the same commands to wake up our AI?
This is just the tip of the iceberg.
Of course it is brand awareness driving profits, right?
I personally want to wake up my AI with commands I want.

Re:The REAL problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Worf Three Seven Gamma Echo!

"Cheese" and "Whiskey"

[Anonymous Coward]

Does the Android camera still take pictures when you (or an advert) says Cheese or Whiskey?

in related news...

[Anonymous Coward]

Burger King advertisement voice actor sues google for bricking devices...

Better Idea

[Demena]

Google should have cheated on the sort algorithm and put in their own add in top place: "A slab of muscle tissue from an immature castrated bull between two lumps of overheated grains stripped of their nutritional components, accompanied by...."

Re:Better Idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Google doesn't want to draw attention to the flawed nature of their product.

Re:Better Idea

[Zibodiz]

Another funny option would have been if it "accidentally" played a McDonald's commercial when prompted with that question.

I thought it was pretty darn funny.

[sabbede]

I saw the ad once and it cracked me up. Burger King was right, it was clever. The "Whopper burger" bit had me thinking that maybe searching for just "whopper" would return pictures of big black dicks or something. It didn't for me, first page was all burger related.

Re:I thought it was pretty darn funny.

[sabbede]

Had to amend my search to "whopper BBC".

Re:I thought it was pretty darn funny.

[Cro Magnon]

I didn't see the ad, and I don't have Google Home. I probably would have thought it was funny, chuckled, then thought about the ramifications and thought "Holy Shit". This incident was funny, but the idea of a voice on TV taking over my (hypothetical) smart home is scary.

Re:I thought it was pretty darn funny.

[sabbede]

Maybe it would freak some people out, but maybe more people wished they had a Google assistant running so they could get in on the fun. My reaction was more towards the latter, though I'm not entirely comfortable with the idea of talking to machines. Well, with might be more accurate. I prefer my conversations with computers to be one sided and profanity laden - as in, "Come on you little f-er just f-ing boot, come on come on OH YOU LITTLE S-T! NONONONO! F-! C-SUCKER!".

Time to change the trigger ?

[Anonymous Coward]

How about "oh F***, what is a ....". :) Thus ending all possibilities of this occurring

Well, at least they're keeping up with tech...

[Shoten]

Burger King's ad campaigns have been the laughing stock of the advertising world forever. I was studying marketing back in the 80s, in college, and had a subscription to Advertising Age (the leading trade publication of the industry). At that time, Burger King's campaign revolved around the phrase, "Burger King. Sometimes you just gotta break the rules." It was considered so ridiculous that Advertising Age held a contest to see if anyone could come up with anything even more insane. Finalists in the top-5 included "Long John Silver's, for the seafood lover that is Allah"...and, of course because someone submitted it, "Burger King. Sometimes you just gotta break the rules." This was about three decades ago.

Then there was their whole "chicken fries" campaign, back in the...was that the 90s? I have no idea what the fuck that was all about, though the "band" that was prominently featured there openly admitted that they did the ads because they realized they weren't going to make it as real musicians so they may as well sell out. And this admission wasn't on some interview or a website off to the side...it was featured front-and-center on the official website that Burger King stood up for the ad campaign.

So, at least Burger King is keeping up with the times, finding new and innovative ways to blow dead goats with their ad campaigns.

Missed opportunity

[Anonymous Coward]

Google missed an opportunity here. They should have programmed it to respond with something like "something almost but not completely unlike a hamburger" or gone with kickback money from McD's and said something like "a pale imitation of McDonald's quarter pounder" or even "hamburger royale".

Re:Missed opportunity

[tattood]

or even "hamburger royale".

I think you mean "Royale with cheese".

Re:Missed opportunity

[Knuckles]

Google missed an opportunity here. They should have programmed it to respond with something like "something almost but not completely unlike a hamburger" or gone with kickback money from McD's and said something like "a pale imitation of McDonald's quarter pounder" or even "hamburger royale".

Google was just quoting Wikipedia and it was swiftly edited:
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/ind...

Re: Missed opportunity

[EdReynolds]

Bravo! I thought the same thing. Google could have made it the biggest usurped ad in history by redirecting the answer to a competitor's ad.

This is why

[Anonymous Coward]

I will never purchase these types of devises.

IFTTT to the rescue.

[faedle]

IF THIS(GoogleAssistant("What is the Whopper burger"); say("A flaming piece of feces.")
        THEN(trigger some dummy action like sending a notification)

Problem solved.

Registered sound clip?

[choovanski]

> Google has likely registered the sound clip from the ad to disable unwanted Home triggers, as it does with its own Google Home commercials. This leaves me wondering if the actors from these commercials are unable to use the service. "OK, Google. *ahem* OK, Google. HEY! OK, GOOGLE! Dammit, it's really me this time!"

Re:Registered sound clip?

[Anonymous Coward]

I use "ECH Omega Four Two" so that I can script my Google Home device with Dr. Sbaitso.

Rich

[JThundley]

"Waaaah, I pay for television to deliver me advertising and then it communicated with the device I bought for spying and advertising and the device advertised to me!"

The amount of sympathy I have for these brainiacs could be measured with electron scanning microscope.

Re:Rich

[david_thornley]

So, as long as something is sleazy, it gets to break the rules? I'd think that we'd have to hold such enterprises to the rules more strictly.

You're blaming the victim.

Re:Rich

[JThundley]

Are they really victims if they bought into it? It's like calling a person into BDSM a victim of violence. They're not victims, they love it. If they didn't, they wouldn't partake in it.

Just make Google respond with the nutrition facts

[SnarkSide]

It would have been more fun if they made the system respond with the nutrition facts instead of the Wikipedia info. That would teach them a lesson about taking that gamble in the future.