>I don't believe that my phone is not listening to me and I challenge you to choose a random word out of the dictionary and say it 100 times in front of your phone.

The person making the claim should be responsible for furnishing the proof. If it's really so simple to prove, why hasn't anyone done a carefully controlled experiment proving this once and for all? At the very least, it'd move us beyond vague anecdotes on social media.

> If it's really so simple to prove, why hasn't anyone done a carefully controlled experiment proving this once and for all?

They did, and found no listening being done. It’s in the article under “The data doesn't add up”.

> I challenge you to choose a random word out of the dictionary and say it 100 times in front of your phone.

That test has been done. It is explained at length in the article under the heading “The data doesn't add up”.

It’s too easy to check on your phone if such a thing were happening.

Your TV though… that IS listening and the TV even has options to disable it. It’s on every TV shipped in at least the last 5 years, maybe 10.

A few times per year I similarly have a conversation with my wife at night (lastly about a hair type) and the next morning a corresponding ad was presented at her at Facebook (shampoo). Only her Android phone was at the room (open, logged in Facebook in Chrome, no app). I definitely believe they hear us but they trigger the action with care and selectively, so as not to get caught (eg to low tech people, when the ad is very relevant to the need etc).

I am astonished that nobody had ever done a reverse engineering research yet.

> but they trigger the action with care and selectively, so as not to get caught (eg to low tech people

That would be an awful plan. Low tech people are the ones who most frequently complain of this because they have no basis to think it wouldn’t happen.

> I am astonished that nobody had ever done a reverse engineering research yet.

They have. It’s described in the article.

People have! They haven't found anything yet.

>I am astonished that nobody had ever done a reverse engineering research yet.

They have, what you think is happening has been disproven tons of times. You just don't want to believe it.

Was there a smart tv in the room with you during that conversation?

good point!

>One time my wife and I had a random conversation, utterly random, about cat hamster wheels. Like, why doesn't that exist? I got an ad for it the next day (it exists).

Your wife probably googled them as soon as you were done talking about them and then you using the same network got an ad for them.

And then your wife went and looked them up to see if they do exist and your IP was added for retargeting.