Someone is always watching. Credit:Phil Carrick Smartphones A small box that can collect location data, detect motion, store audio and video plus keeps track of your online activities, your phone provides a way for most of your apps and services to "listen in" on you in one way or another, not to mention a microphone which researchers have manipulated to spy . Apple's Siri, for example, functions almost identically to Samsung's voice recognition. These services rely on a dedicated voice-recognition service somewhere in the cloud to take your complex requests and queries, translate them into understandable text, and send them back to your phone or TV.

You can easily control when a Samsung Smart will and will not collect voice data, the company says. Credit:AFR While they may not be actively listening 24 hours a day, at the very least they are monitoring the microphone's feed in expectation of a command. Video game consoles Illustration: Ron Tandberg. Microsoft's Xbox One and its attached Kinect sensor works the same way, but adds video to the mix as well. Kinect keeps track of the people in a room so it can detect who's present and load their preferences accordingly, or zoom and pan the camera to make sure everybody is in frame during a Skype call.

Microsoft faced backlash in 2013 for its zealous attitude toward collecting data from Kinect (which eventually forced it to dial back its plans) and, coincidentally in the same year, LG landed in some strife for a voice-activated TV that was found to send voice recordings online. Your phone provides data on your movements, purchases, preferences, searches, and communications to countless apps and services. Credit:Reuters Coffee machines and airconditioners A device that "listens" before using the internet to provide us with a service is not a new idea. The trigger for controversy, it seems, is the revelation that a device could do that without us explicitly telling it to. Yet this is the cornerstone of many devices and services we use every day (including web browsers, social media, smart public transport cards, Google Now etc) and will continue to be so as we move towards the all-connected "internet of things". The Smarter Wi-Fi Coffee Machine. It knows when you wake up or when you're likely to get home so it can greet you with sweet caffeine. Credit:Smarter

A connected coffee-maker, for example, collates data about when you're home so it knows when to make coffee. Ditto for connected airconditioners. Both devices are soon to be (or already are) on the market, and necessarily "listen in" on your life and activities, collecting data on you so they can do their job. LG already has an voice-command airconditioner that literally "listens in", cooling the room if you yell out that it's too hot. Is this form of data collection really so scary considering the reams of information we already gladly hand over to the companies that provide our email, maps or ride-share services? Are we really concerned about Samsung's microphones in our house and fine with the microphone, GPS and camera we take around in our pocket literally every day? A common piece of advice when it comes to the internet is "if you don't want the whole world to hear about it, don't say it online". Increasingly, we not only have to apply this test to emails and facebook messages but to the data we allow our appliances and devices to collect as well. If it's connected to the internet, assume this data is being transmitted online. Some privacy-minded folks advocate active avoidance, keeping the use of these devices to a minimum, disabling settings or placing a piece of sticky tape over your device's data-collecting apparatus. Others take pride in their old-school Nokia phones, dumb TVs and ability to "stay off the grid".