Jan 7, 2017Single source
A TV segment about Alexa ordering a dollhouse made viewers' Alexas order dollhouses
Rogue: Acted on its own, Caused harmAI loose in the worldUnauthorized actionDERIVED
Approved by person, Oct 11, 2026. How entries are approved
A San Diego CW6 news segment about a six-year-old in Texas who had talked her family's Amazon Echo into ordering a dollhouse ended with anchor Jim Patton remarking on air: 'I love the little girl, saying Alexa ordered me a dollhouse.' According to CW6 News, Echo owners who were watching the broadcast had their devices hear the anchor's words as a purchase command, and a wave of viewers' assistants began trying to order dollhouses themselves. A local news report about an accidental voice purchase became the trigger for more accidental voice purchases.
What this means for youAt home, a voice assistant can mistake TV or other people's speech for your command and spend your money. Check that voice purchasing is off or protected by a PIN in the Alexa app settings.
Sources
- The Vergehttps://www.theverge.com/2017/1/7/14200210/amazon-alexa-tech-news-anchor-order-dollhouse
Incident records from the AI Agent Incident Database by sipi.bot (https://sipi.bot/incidents/), licensed CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
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Covered by snapshot 45
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