For years, smartphone users have suspected that their devices were eavesdropping on their conversations to serve targeted ads. Now, recent revelations suggest these concerns could be justified.
A leaked pitch deck from CMG Local Solutions, a subsidiary of Cox Media Group (CMG), details a method it calls “active listening.” This method uses AI to combine voice data with online behavioral data to deliver hyper-targeted advertising.
The deck, obtained by 404 Media, states, “Advertisers can pair this voice-data with behavioral data to target in-market consumers.” It goes on to say that the technology can identify “ready-to-buy” consumers and create ad lists based on their spoken intentions.
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A spokesperson for CMG told Newsweek that “CMG businesses have never listened to any conversations nor had access to anything beyond third-party aggregated, anonymized, and fully encrypted data sets that can be used for ad placement.”
In other words, CMG acquired existing voice datasets from third-party providers to combine …