Alexa, Emotions, Privacy and GDPR

We exist in a world where emotional expression is a central facet of what makes us human. It allows us to interact richly with others and aids us in functioning as a society. Affective computing, also known as artificial emotional intelligence is the area of study that seeks to enable the development of systems and devices with the capacity to understand and replicate these human affects. The race is on to develop intelligent computing systems that can mimic human interaction and also emulate and convince humans that they are human too, building a sense of trust. The Amazon Echo and its intelligent personal assistant, “Alexa”, is currently one of the most popular and pervasive of these intelligent devices. The human name given to this technological entity alludes to its human-like conversation abilities. However, most adult humans would quickly establish that „Alexa‟. is not a real person. This is obviously intimated through the automated voice, but is further demonstrated by a lack of recognition and display of any emotion. The advent of VCDs like Alexa raises a plethora of significant standard privacy considerations. This paper provides further speculation into the privacy concerns relating to the ability of these devices to gather data relating to an individual.s emotional state. This is conducted with consideration for the new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) introduced in May, 2018.

Content

Author and article information

Contributors

Eoghan Furey

Juanita Blue

Conference

Publication date: July 2018

Publication date (Print): July 2018

Pages: 1-5

Affiliations

[0001]Letterkenny Institute of Technology Letterkenny, Co. Donegal, Rep. of Ireland

[0002]University of Ulster Derry, Northern Ireland, UK

Article

DOI: 10.14236/ewic/HCI2018.212

SO-VID: f0762f59-c68a-44e7-85ba-64b21770178e

License:

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Conference name: Proceedings of the 32nd International BCS Human Computer Interaction Conference

Conference acronym: HCI

Conference number: 32

Conference location: Belfast, UK

Conference date: 4 - 6 July 2018

Conference sponsor: Electronic Workshops in Computing (eWiC)

Conference theme: Human Computer Interaction Conference

History

Product

1477-9358 BCS Learning & Development

Self URI (article page): https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.14236/ewic/HCI2018.212

Self URI (journal page): https://ewic.bcs.org/

REFERENCES

L. BiljanaS. RisteskaKV. Trivodaliev A review of Internet of Things for smart home: Challenges and solutions Journal of Cleaner Production 140 3 1454 1464 2017
J. BlueE. FureyJ. Condell “A novel approach for secure identity authentication in legacy database systems” 28th Irish Signals and Systems Conference (ISSC) 2017
Ann Bowling Research methods in health: investigating health and health services McGraw-Hill Education (UK) 2014
E. Boughman “Is There An Echo In Here? What You Need To Consider About Privacy Protection” Forbes Legal Council http://www.forbes.com/sites/forbeslegalcouncil/2017/09/18/is-there-an-echo-in-here-what-you-need-to-consider-about-privacy-protection/#395461bb38fd, September 2017
C. CadwalladrE. Graham-Harrison “Revealed: 50 million Facebook profiles harvested for Cambridge Analytica in major data breach” The Guardian 17 2018
J. DaubertA. WiesmaierP. Kikiras “A view on privacy & trust in IoT” In Communication Workshop (ICCW), 2015 IEEE International Conference on 2665 2670 IEEE 2015
European Parliament & Council of the European Union “General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679” EU 2016
E. FureyJ. Blue “She Knows Too Much – Voice Command Devices and Privacy” 29th Irish Signals and Systems Conference (ISSC) 2018
N. Goksel CanbekM. Mutlu “On the track of Artificial Intelligence: Learning with Intelligent Personal Assistants” Journal of Human Sciences 13 1 2016
P. GuillotelA. KoenigG. ChanelD. Novak “Toward Commercial Applications Of Affective Computing” 2015
C. Izard “Emotion theory and research: Highlights, unanswered questions, and emerging issues” Annual review of psychology 60 2009 1 25
P. KostkovaH. BrewerS. de LusignanE. FottrellB. GoldacreG. HartP. KoczanP. KnightC. MarsolierR.A. McKendryE. Ross “Who owns the data? Open data for healthcare” Frontiers in public health 4 7 2016
G. LópezL. QuesadaL.A. Guerrero “Alexa vs. Siri vs. Cortana vs. Google Assistant: A Comparison of Speech-Based Natural User Interfaces” I. Nunes (eds) Advances in Human Factors and Systems Interaction. AHFE 2017. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing 592 Springer Cham 2018
R. Mojtabai “Diagnosing depression in older adults in primary care” New England Journal of Medicine 370 13 2014 1180 1182
E.U. Regulation “679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation)” Off J Eur Union L119 2016
J. Slanely “GDPR Causes Call Recording Headache” Comms Business Magazine http://commsbusiness.co.uk/features/gdpr-causes-call-recording-headace/, October 2017
P. SoujanyaE. CambriaR. BajpaiA. Hussain “A review of affective computing: From unimodal analysis to multimodal fusion” Information Fusion 37 2017 98 125
S. SpiekermannA. AcquistiR. BöhmeK.L. Hui “The challenges of personal data markets and privacy” Electronic Markets 25 2 161 167 2015
C. StorrP. Storr “Internet of Things: Right to Data from a European Perspective” M. CorralesM. FenwickN. Forgó (eds) New Technology, Big Data and the Law. Perspectives in Law, Business and Innovation Springer Singapore 2018
K. Vishal “Big Data facts” http://analyticsweek.com/content/big-data-facts/, August 2017
S. WheatleyT. MaillartD. Sornette “The extreme risk of personal data breaches and the erosion of privacy” The European Physical Journal B 89 1 7 2016

Comments

Comment on this article

[1] L. BiljanaS. RisteskaKV. Trivodaliev A review of Internet of Things for smart home: Challenges and solutions Journal of Cleaner Production 140 3 1454 1464 2017

[2] J. BlueE. FureyJ. Condell “A novel approach for secure identity authentication in legacy database systems” 28th Irish Signals and Systems Conference (ISSC) 2017

[3] Ann Bowling Research methods in health: investigating health and health services McGraw-Hill Education (UK) 2014

[4] E. Boughman “Is There An Echo In Here? What You Need To Consider About Privacy Protection” Forbes Legal Council http://www.forbes.com/sites/forbeslegalcouncil/2017/09/18/is-there-an-echo-in-here-what-you-need-to-consider-about-privacy-protection/#395461bb38fd, September 2017

[5] C. CadwalladrE. Graham-Harrison “Revealed: 50 million Facebook profiles harvested for Cambridge Analytica in major data breach” The Guardian 17 2018

[6] J. DaubertA. WiesmaierP. Kikiras “A view on privacy & trust in IoT” In Communication Workshop (ICCW), 2015 IEEE International Conference on 2665 2670 IEEE 2015

[7] European Parliament & Council of the European Union “General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679” EU 2016

[8] E. FureyJ. Blue “She Knows Too Much – Voice Command Devices and Privacy” 29th Irish Signals and Systems Conference (ISSC) 2018

[9] N. Goksel CanbekM. Mutlu “On the track of Artificial Intelligence: Learning with Intelligent Personal Assistants” Journal of Human Sciences 13 1 2016

[10] P. GuillotelA. KoenigG. ChanelD. Novak “Toward Commercial Applications Of Affective Computing” 2015

[11] C. Izard “Emotion theory and research: Highlights, unanswered questions, and emerging issues” Annual review of psychology 60 2009 1 25

[12] P. KostkovaH. BrewerS. de LusignanE. FottrellB. GoldacreG. HartP. KoczanP. KnightC. MarsolierR.A. McKendryE. Ross “Who owns the data? Open data for healthcare” Frontiers in public health 4 7 2016

[13] G. LópezL. QuesadaL.A. Guerrero “Alexa vs. Siri vs. Cortana vs. Google Assistant: A Comparison of Speech-Based Natural User Interfaces” I. Nunes (eds) Advances in Human Factors and Systems Interaction. AHFE 2017. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing 592 Springer Cham 2018

[14] R. Mojtabai “Diagnosing depression in older adults in primary care” New England Journal of Medicine 370 13 2014 1180 1182

[15] E.U. Regulation “679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation)” Off J Eur Union L119 2016

[16] J. Slanely “GDPR Causes Call Recording Headache” Comms Business Magazine http://commsbusiness.co.uk/features/gdpr-causes-call-recording-headace/, October 2017

[17] P. SoujanyaE. CambriaR. BajpaiA. Hussain “A review of affective computing: From unimodal analysis to multimodal fusion” Information Fusion 37 2017 98 125

[18] S. SpiekermannA. AcquistiR. BöhmeK.L. Hui “The challenges of personal data markets and privacy” Electronic Markets 25 2 161 167 2015

[19] C. StorrP. Storr “Internet of Things: Right to Data from a European Perspective” M. CorralesM. FenwickN. Forgó (eds) New Technology, Big Data and the Law. Perspectives in Law, Business and Innovation Springer Singapore 2018

[20] K. Vishal “Big Data facts” http://analyticsweek.com/content/big-data-facts/, August 2017

[21] S. WheatleyT. MaillartD. Sornette “The extreme risk of personal data breaches and the erosion of privacy” The European Physical Journal B 89 1 7 2016

Celebrating 65 years of The Computer Journal - free-to-read perspectives - bcs.org/tcj65