IBM Outlaws Siri, Worried She Has Loose Lips

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It would seem IBM has banned Siri because the company is worried that "spoken queries might be stored somewhere.”

Siri isn’t welcome on Big Blue’s networks. The reason? Siri ships everything you say to her to a big data center in Maiden, North Carolina. And the story of what really happens to all of your Siri-launched searches, e-mail messages and inappropriate jokes is a bit of a black box.
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I'm not surprised... many companies have similar policies when it comes to their data (especially ones that have govt. contracts and such)
 
Do they really think anyone is going to ask Siri something specific about sensitive company information?

The only thing I've ever used it for was to remind me to check my oil or buy deodorant.
 
RazorWind said:
Do they really think anyone is going to ask Siri something specific about sensitive company information?

The only thing I've ever used it for was to remind me to check my oil or buy deodorant.
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you're probably right, but it's probably better to be safe than sorry.

I've always wondered why Siri handled everything remotely (other than for speed and potentially using voice recordings to improve accuracy)
 
Having worked for IBM, I can tell you that they are very concerned with security on multiple levels. You aren't supposed to use USB flash drives on their equipment they don't know about.
 
dr.stevil said:
you're probably right, but it's probably better to be safe than sorry.

I've always wondered why Siri handled everything remotely (other than for speed and potentially using voice recordings to improve accuracy)
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Me too. I don't think there would be people who would do that, but IBM as you said are just playing it safe, just in case someone not smart did that.
 
Why would data need to be sent to a remote data-center to better conversion? Shouldn't it have it's own native STT engine within the application?
 
nOrVow said:
Why would data need to be sent to a remote data-center to better conversion? Shouldn't it have it's own native STT engine within the application?
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These smartphones aren't as smart as they seem sometimes. The processing is offloaded on remote servers.

Also a lot of siri queries drop through to wolfram-alpha, so there's at least one third party involved.
 
RazorWind said:
Do they really think anyone is going to ask Siri something specific about sensitive company information?

The only thing I've ever used it for was to remind me to check my oil or buy deodorant.
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You'd be surprised at the stupid things people do with technology. Well if you are an H reader, maybe less so, but still surprised. Shout out to the Stupid Facebook Criminal of the Day posts. :D
 
Siri, could you open the F-35 CAD file on my phone and analyze the main fuselage for structural integrity. Oh and this time try not to let the Chinese see.


Siri is great for text messaging and setting alarms. But sprint has terrible service in DFW and half the places I go she doesn't work specifically because of the server based nature.
 
perhaps (and this is just a guess since it's a black box) the searches are being stored for quicker response. Lets say at 3am someone searches for the answer to 3 + 3 and later in the day several hundred other people search for the same answer. I would think on the next search the system would check to see if it's been answered before doing a full blown search. Perhaps it's stored locally verse having to crunch data for the full result every time.. thus a savings of usage.
 
Bu...But...I tell Siri all my deepest and darkest secrets. You're telling me she's not trustworthy? :eek:
 
beowulf7 said:
It's Apple. What do you think?
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I'm not really sure why they'd want to store audio of millions of people talking to siri. I'm sure they do store some of it (much like MS asks users to submit voice samples for Kinect) to help engineers improve the service, but it seems like a hell of a lot of data to store all of it. I guess I don't see any other real benefit.
 
People are actually surprised by this?

/shakes head
 
It came as a surprise to some folks at a recent SXSW talk that Apple’s Siri “personal assistant” isn’t just working for us, it’s working full-time for Apple too by sending lots of our personal voice and user info to Apple to stockpile in its databases. Take a peek at Siri’s privacy policy (which, by the way, is pretty difficult to find) and you’ll realize what’s happening behind the scenes.

What info of yours is being collected and how is it being used? When you use Siri, it’s sending your “Voice Input Data” and “User Data” to Apple to be used for a variety of purposes.

more here
https://www.aclunc.org/issues/techn...or_me,_working_full-time_for_apple,_too.shtml
 
Not only is this a reason why I don't enable Siri, but I also don't use it since it uses a separate core (or at least Apple says it requires the dual core processors) and all inquiries are handled externally...meaning the phone has to burn power to use 3G to analyze my voice.

dr.stevil said:
Sends to, yes... not sure about being saved though. I don't think they've ever said what they do with it.
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Apple definitely stores it. When you disable Siri in the iPhone settings, it gives you a warning that disabling it will delete/wipe all your stored inquiries and voice data on their servers.

Again...I don't like Apple making records of my voice asking for things and what it is I'm asking for.

Siri, find me the nearest strip club.
 
Wasnt it a worm that shut down Iran's nuke progam for a bit? Didnt the worm get planted in the surrounding villages for weeks and months before someone broke protocal and then eventually the worm got in the network? I seem to remember that happening.

You'd be amazed just how stupid people are, even in a place as high secruity as Iran's nuke plant, but alas, ther will always be an idiot and sooner or later that person can topple an entire network.

in Iraq you'd be amazed what I saw people from every branch, even contractors making big bucks, doing with their data devices, even on really secure networks. Do you have any idea how many sat's I had to re-do because of security violations?

And it's not just military things, the private sector has secrets that could destroy an entire product line. Imagine if the iPad design was stolen and samsung or someone else released a better device a month before the ipad for 100$ less. not only would they be able to beat the product in every single way and be cheaper, they'd secure so much more in sales and if apple launched there's a good chance the product wouldnt sell well at all, costing apple HUGE in R&D and marketing, while samsung or whoever cashes in hard on all of Apple's work. Just an example but you can apply this to MANY things.

Loose lips sink ships, loose tweets sink fleets, loose Siri, well, that just is a punchline for an Apple joke, but you get the idea.
 
RazorWind said:
Do they really think anyone is going to ask Siri something specific about sensitive company information?

The only thing I've ever used it for was to remind me to check my oil or buy deodorant.
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the Chinese gov will. They will ask for source code too
 
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