Amazon’s voice recognition software only listens when you say the word “Alexa,” right?

That’s what most Echo and Dot buyers think because that’s what the advertising leads you to believe. As if by magic, your Alexa-enabled device “wakes up” when you say its name. But think about that for a moment. After you say the magic word, your Alexa-enabled device must listen for your request, interpret it, and respond. Just how much does Amazon really listen to inside your home? How much you really know about how voice technology works when you unboxed your Alexa-enabled device?

(Fair warning: this is about to get awkward.)

You may have assumed your Echo or Dot listened and responded using the small computer housed inside the device itself. But that doesn’t make sense. The on-board computer simply isn’t powerful enough. And besides, Amazon continues to update the device. It must do this from a centralized server location. That’s the only place where there is enough computing power not only to interpret your request, but also to update Alexa with new “skills” from third-party vendors. That’s how your device now knows how to order a pizza. Amazon needed to partner with Domino’s Pizza (in the United States) to develop that interface.

Now that you know that your voice recordings are being sent via the internet to a centralized location, you may have assumed Amazon will need to store that data for some period of time — for example, to use its Natural Language Processing algorithms to interpret your request for a weather report (or to buy a pizza), gather that information, and then send it back to your device for it to speak the response. The transaction happens so quickly that you assume Amazon would have no reason to keep the recording of your voice any longer than a few seconds. Besides, is that even feasible? Think of how much storage space Amazon would require for all of the audio files. Is there really a database somewhere storing all your “requests for weather reports?”

Those are good questions.

Imagine for a moment that you were curious about what, precisely, your Amazon Echo or Dot device recorded in your home. Now that you know it’s listening, you’d like to know what it heard. To satisfy that curiosity and put your mind at ease, you ask Amazon to send you a copy of the data your device has collected since you bought it.

After a few weeks, you receive your audio files from Amazon. Imagine your horror as you open the attachments and begin listening to the recordings: A discussion of what to have for dinner, two children arguing over a toy, a woman talking to her partner as she gets into the shower. You weren’t really sure if Amazon would keep recordings at all. And if they did keep recordings, you thought your Echo or Dot recorded only your explicit requests.

But it gets worse. You don’t recognize any of the voices. With equal parts relief and horror, you realize you are listening to someone else’s Echo recordings!