How to Listen to and Delete Everything Your Alexa Recorded
Last week, a story circulated on the network that Alexa recorded a private conversation of a woman and then sent it to her friend. While this was certainly a unique quandary, it can be helpful to periodically look at what your own Alexa has caught.
Amazon’s argument against the erroneously sent message was that Echo must have believed it had heard the command. A good rule of thumb is not to say “Alexa” in your home unless you want to interact with the device. However, I know that I watched TV in our living room without mentioning Alex from me or from the TV, and she intervenes to tell us that she didn’t quite hear something.
The Verge noted today that you can check what your Alexa is doing here by going to the Alexa app. When you find something you don’t want to be in her story, you can also delete them in place.
To see what your Alexa is listening to, launch the Alexa app on your phone and then tap the hamburger icon (these three lines are stacked on top of each other) in the upper left corner of the screen. From there click on Settings and then History.
It’s a little deeper than what you see on the home screen and shows both successful and unsuccessful commands.
For some you will see “no text available” for the command, you can click on them and see exactly what Alexa heard and thought it was meant for me.
For me, this answer is a bunch of costumes that I watched in the last month. If you find entries you want to delete, you can also delete them right in the app.
It won’t stop you from getting into an accident (although it seems unlikely to start with), but it can help you better understand what Alexa is catching so you can change your habits (or change her location) to prevent any future problems.