Amazon agrees to pay $30 mn to settle privacy lawsuits

Amazon agreed to pay more than $30 million to settle two lawsuits filed against the retail giant, alleging privacy violations with its Alexa voice assistant and Ring doorbell camera.

On Wednesday, the FTC voted to file charges against Amazon in two separate cases. The two cases could force the online retailer to delete some data acquired through internet-connected devices like those powered by the Alexa voice assistant.

The FTC alleges that Amazon deceived users for years when it came to Amazon's voice assistant service.

The FTC said the device captured recordings of children and held onto them unless parents asked to have the recordings deleted.

Even then, the FTC said, Amazon continued to hold onto the transcripts of the recordings.

Amazon has been ordered to delete all inactivities for children, geolocation data and some voice information.

The Federal Trade Commission imposed a $24 million fine against Amazon and accused it of violating the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act. FTC Consumer Protection Chief Samuel Levine also accused Amazon of sacrificing privacy for profits by blocking parents' deletion requests. We built Alexa with strong privacy protections and customer controls, designed Amazon Kids to comply with COPPA, and collaborated with the FTC before expanding Amazon Kids to include Alexa, Amazon said in a statement. In part of the settlement, we agreed to make a small amendment to our already strong practices and will remove child profiles that have been inactive for more than 18 months unless a parent or guardian chooses to keep them. FTC Commissioner Alvaro Bedoya, a US federal judge, has accused Amazon of keeping the children's data to continue refining its algorithm behind the voice recognition system.

In a statement, Bedoya said, Machine learning is no excuse to break the law. Today's settlement on Amazon Alexa will send alarms to parents across the nation and is a warning for all AI companies that are sprinting to acquire more and more data. The FTC alleges that Amazon, acquired by Amazon in 2018, allowed employees and Contractors to view private videos of consumers. It also provided weak security methods that allowed hackers to control some accounts.

Ring, a home security camera company, was accused of causing most of the violations before Amazon acquired the company.

Ring promptly addressed the issues at hand on its own years ago, well before the FTC began its inquiry, Amazon said. Our focus has been and remains on delivering products and features that our clients love, while upholding our commitment to safeguard their privacy and security. The FTC is requiring Ring to pay $5.8 million to be used for refunds to consumers.

The federal judges must still approve both the Ring and Alexa orders.

While Amazon doesn't support the FTC's allegations regarding both Ring and Alexa, it said the settlement will help put the matter behind them.