Apple Lossless Audio CODEC (ALAC), announced in June that it intends to launch a smart speaker called HomePod, this being thought to attack a market that is continuously growing. Apple provided a series of details for the HomePod during the June conference where it revealed its smart speaker, but since then it has avoided talking about this product, which is still to be launched in the latter part of this year, although it is not known exactly when
However, Apple was asked today if it does not intend to record with the HomePod everything that is heard in people's homes in order to analyze the data and sell it to third-party companies. Well, the Apple company answered this question by saying that the Homepod does not record sounds until the user says the phrase Hey Siri, at that moment the sounds from the room were picked up.
Apple says that from that moment all audio recordings are encrypted and have an anonymous Siri ID, so the connection between the user who gave the command and the HomePod cannot be made. Basically, Apple says that it cannot identify the people who use HomePod in one way or another, but it does not say that it will not analyze that data after registration, nor that it will not share or sell it to third-party companies if it wants to.
Apple claims, however, that with regard to the function of locating the smart speaker in a room and creating a virtual map of it, all the information is stored locally, in the HomePod. Apple does not receive any information regarding the room in which the HomePod is used, so users should be quiet because Apple will have no way to listen to them or create maps of their rooms without them knowing.
"No information is sent to Apple servers until HomePod recognizes the key utterance "Hey Siri," and any information after that point is encrypted and sent via an anonymous Siri ID. For room sensing, all analysis is done locally on the device and is not shared with Apple."
