Latest Chrome beta listens for your voice, searches the web

[Scorpus]

Over the course of the past few years, Google has been integrating a number of features from the Android version of Chrome into their desktop browser. Today, the company revealed that hands-free Google voice searching is available in the latest Chrome beta build, giving desktop users a feature we've come to love from Android's Now Launcher.

Similar to how voice searching functions with Now Launcher, in Chrome you'll be able to open a new tab or visit the Google homepage, say "OK Google" and then proceed to search via voice recognition; no typing or clicking required. As well as searching, you'll be able to ask Chrome to set a timer, or create a reminder that will show up in Google Now.

To have Chrome listening to your every word will naturally throw up some privacy concerns, as Google could theoretically use the data for demographical purposes or ad targeting. However the feature will be disabled by default, meaning anyone who wants to hands-free voice search will have to enable it first through the Google.com homepage.

Anyone running the latest Chrome beta in US English should see the feature go live in the coming days, while support for additional languages and Chrome OS will be "coming soon". If you're using a stable version of the browser, expect hands-free voice searching to arrive in the coming weeks as part of Google's regular Chrome release cycle.

Download the latest Chrome Beta here: Windows|Mac|Linux

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https://www.techspot.com/news/55838-latest-chrome-beta-listens-for-your-voice-searches-the-web.html

 

[VitalyT]

...looks into your eyes, sends a probe in your anus...

Half of web regulars can't make sense in a trivial conversation, not to mention dictating something meaningful to a search engine. That's why all that variety of voice systems never made it to the big market. Too many accents, too many ways of conversing.

I think this video sums it up nicely...

 

[Guest]

Is this still a browser or fracking spyware or maybe rather surveillance software?!

 

[Guest]

Yay. Now the NSA can listen in to your microphone 24/7 without any of the old hassle.

 

[OliTheG]

Yay. Now the NSA can listen in to your microphone 24/7 without any of the old hassle.

Ok, so let's sort out a few things. I'm guessing that although your life has been in no way affected by the NSA's spying, and are a fully lawful citizen (and although you are allowed to be annoyed at the breach of your privacy) you haven't had the 21st century equivilant of the SS come and break down your door to take you to jail for googling "Daily Mail."

All they could ever decipher is your voice, and what you are saying (googling). Let's assume the NSA have backdoors into google and are using it to track people, with the hope of snagging somebody who then searches google for "child porn" or "ways to murder my significant other" or even "how do I form my own opinion on something and still have the internet be my friend?" Well, they could just see what you typed into google and searched for. They don't need your voice.

So basically, this affects nothing, because they probably already know what you are searching for, and listening on literally tens of millions of voice searches a year is just a bit infeasible.

 

[Guest]

You all may not know this, but your browser already listens to you. When you type a letter, it is doing what the keyboard tells it to do and the keyboard does what your fingers tell it to do. And ALL this info is passed on the ISP. Whats the difference if you do a search with your voice or your fingers. The info is still shared regardless of how you input it.

to those tinhat types:

No one cares about you, seriously.
I am not listening to you because you are of no importance, seriously.
You may think you are a big deal but you really are not, seriously.

 

[NTAPRO]

Hope it's better than that nose thing they tried a good while back

 

[OliTheG]

You all may not know this, but your browser already listens to you. When you type a letter, it is doing what the keyboard tells it to do and the keyboard does what your fingers tell it to do. And ALL this info is passed on the ISP. Whats the difference if you do a search with your voice or your fingers. The info is still shared regardless of how you input it.

to those tinhat types:

No one cares about you, seriously.
I am not listening to you because you are of no importance, seriously.
You may think you are a big deal but you really are not, seriously.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

 

[Guest]

@ OliTheG: Actually it has been proven that your voice is just like a fingerprint, and computers can now use it to identify you. In fact it is more accurate than a fingerprint. Your voice has about 120 security points, whereas your fingerprint has only 40. So no, it isn't exactly like your capturing what you type on your keyboard.

While your typed searches are recorded, it can't be proven without a doubt that it was actually you using your computer at the time. Voice searches on the other hand... well you get where I'm going with this.

 

[Guest]

Yay. Now the NSA can listen in to your microphone 24/7 without any of the old hassle.

Grow up and take your damn tinfoil hat off. The NSA does not give a damn about your conversation to your mistress, your barber, your gossip, or your life. Sorry, you just are not that important.

 

[Raoul Duke]

Am I the only one that finds this a little creepy?

 

[Holotus]

As we become more dependent on such technology ---- Thought Crimes will become a serious issue.

Google has plans to have devices that interpret our thoughts from our brain waves.

Those in power will try to use this to suppress people.

 

[Guest]

Yay. Now the NSA can listen in to your microphone 24/7 without any of the old hassle.

Grow up and take your damn tinfoil hat off. The NSA does not give a damn about your conversation to your mistress, your barber, your gossip, or your life. Sorry, you just are not that important.

I agree with you. I'm tired of the tinfoil-hat nutjobs (not to mention hopeless virgins) claiming that NSA is out to get the average joe which is absolutely ridiculous.

 

[Raoul Duke]

Yay. Now the NSA can listen in to your microphone 24/7 without any of the old hassle.

Grow up and take your damn tinfoil hat off. The NSA does not give a damn about your conversation to your mistress, your barber, your gossip, or your life. Sorry, you just are not that important.

I agree with you. I'm tired of the tinfoil-hat nutjobs (not to mention hopeless virgins) claiming that NSA is out to get the average joe which is absolutely ridiculous.

The problem is not that they are going after the average joe, they are not, it is the amassing of power by organs of the government that give them the capability should they decide to deploy it to create a situation where any individual can be singled out for any reason and their life completely forked, like cancel US passport, erase you off state computers and ship you out of country to somewhere like Guantanamo where you have no recourse to a lawyer and they can do what they want to you indefinitely. Or to create a totalitarian state where the government knowledge of the individual goes beyond what any fascist or communist state has ever been able to manage so far in history. Do they really need all this information? Has it ever been shown to stop any terrorism? Sure there is freedom, as long as you want to toe the line, come home from work, drink beer and watch tv.

 

[Nobina]

Yay. Now the NSA can listen in to your microphone 24/7 without any of the old hassle.

Grow up and take your damn tinfoil hat off. The NSA does not give a damn about your conversation to your mistress, your barber, your gossip, or your life. Sorry, you just are not that important.

I agree with you. I'm tired of the tinfoil-hat nutjobs (not to mention hopeless virgins) claiming that NSA is out to get the average joe which is absolutely ridiculous.

Spying is not right cause it's invading your privacy. Doesn't matter who you are and what you do or not. It will evolve over time and if you keep being careless they will eventually control you more than you are controlled now since you probably have every set of Apple product.