Smart home devices promise convenience. Voice assistants turn on lights with a simple command. Smart thermostats learn your schedule and adjust temperatures automatically. Security cameras let you monitor your home from anywhere. But every smart device in your home is also a data collection device, recording information about your daily habits, conversations, and activities.
Understanding what these devices collect, where that data goes, and how to limit unnecessary surveillance helps you enjoy the benefits of smart home technology while maintaining reasonable privacy. The goal isn't to eliminate all smart devices but to make informed choices about which ones are worth their privacy cost.
Smart Speakers and Voice Assistants
Amazon Echo, Google Home, and Apple HomePod devices listen constantly for their wake words. When they hear "Alexa," "Hey Google," or "Hey Siri," they record your voice command, send it to company servers for processing, and often store the recording indefinitely.
What They Collect
Voice assistants record every command you give them, including questions asked, products searched for, smart home devices controlled, and sometimes conversations happening near the device. They note when you're home based on usage patterns. Some devices collect information even when you don't use the wake word, triggered by sounds they mistake for activation.
Amazon, Google, and Apple all employ human reviewers who listen to voice recordings to improve their systems. While companies claim recordings are anonymized, they often contain personally identifying information like names, addresses, and account numbers spoken during commands.
Privacy Settings
For Amazon Alexa, open the Alexa app, go to Settings, then Alexa Privacy. Choose "Review Voice History" to see and delete recordings. Turn on "Enable deletion by voice" so you can say "Alexa, delete what I just said." Under "Manage How Your Data Improves Alexa," disable options to prevent human review of your recordings.
For Google Assistant, visit myactivity.google.com, filter by "Voice & Audio," and delete recordings. In the Google Home app, go to Settings, Google Assistant, Your data, and turn off "Voice & Audio Activity" to stop future recording storage, though this limits functionality.
For Apple HomePod, open Settings on your iPhone, select Siri & Search, and disable "Listen for 'Hey Siri'" when you don't need it. Apple stores fewer recordings and for shorter periods than competitors but still collects voice data.
Smart Doorbells and Security Cameras
Video doorbells like Ring and Nest Hello, plus security cameras throughout your home, create continuous video and audio recordings of your property and potentially your neighbors' properties as well.
What They Collect
These devices record video footage continuously or when motion is detected. They capture not just intruders but also family members, guests, delivery workers, and neighbors passing by. Audio recording captures conversations happening near cameras. Cloud storage services retain this footage for days, weeks, or even months.
Ring has faced particular scrutiny for sharing footage with law enforcement without user consent and for lax security that allowed hackers to access cameras and speak to people in their homes. Any cloud-connected camera creates risks of unauthorized access.
Privacy Settings
Review motion detection zones to avoid recording neighbors' property or public sidewalks more than necessary. Disable audio recording if you only need video. Many cameras allow you to set privacy zones that blur out specific areas in recordings.
For Ring devices, open the Ring app, select your device, go to Device Settings, and adjust Motion Settings to reduce false alerts and unnecessary recording. Under Video Settings, you can disable audio recording. In Control Center, review "Video Request" settings to control whether law enforcement can request footage.
Consider local storage options instead of cloud services when possible. Some cameras let you store footage on a local SD card or network-attached storage, keeping videos entirely under your control without sending them to company servers.
Smart Thermostats
Devices like Nest Learning Thermostat and Ecobee collect detailed information about your schedule, temperature preferences, and home occupancy patterns.
What They Collect
Smart thermostats track when you're home and away, how warm or cool you prefer different rooms, and can infer information like when you wake up, leave for work, and go to bed. Some include occupancy sensors that detect movement in different rooms. This data creates a detailed picture of your household routines.
Thermostat companies share aggregated data with energy providers and researchers. While supposedly anonymized, detailed home usage patterns can potentially identify specific households.
Privacy Settings
Disable location-based features like "Auto-Away" if you prefer manual control and don't want your thermostat tracking when you leave home. Turn off occupancy sensing if you find it invasive. Review data sharing settings to opt out of sharing information with third parties when possible.
For Nest thermostats, open the Nest app, go to Settings, then Privacy, and review what data is being collected and shared. You can disable various features that rely on data collection while still maintaining basic thermostat functionality.
Smart TVs
Modern televisions are sophisticated data collection devices that track what you watch, how long you watch it, and often use built-in cameras and microphones for voice control and gesture recognition.
What They Collect
Smart TVs employ Automatic Content Recognition technology that identifies what you're watching, even from cable boxes, DVD players, or game consoles. This viewing data is sold to advertisers and data brokers. Voice-controlled TVs listen for commands similar to smart speakers. Some TVs with cameras track who's watching and for how long.
TV manufacturers like Samsung, LG, and Vizio have all faced criticism and legal action for privacy violations related to excessive data collection and sharing without adequate disclosure.
Privacy Settings
Disable ACR in your TV's privacy settings. The exact location varies by manufacturer but is usually under Settings, Privacy, or Ads. For Samsung TVs, go to Settings, Support, Terms & Privacy, and disable "Viewing Information Services." For LG TVs, find Settings, All Settings, General, Live Plus, and turn it off. For Vizio, disable Smart Interactivity.
Turn off voice recognition features if you don't use them. Cover built-in cameras with tape or a camera cover when not needed. Consider not connecting your TV to the internet at all, using it as a display for external streaming devices whose privacy settings you control more easily.
Smart Locks and Sensors
Connected door locks, window sensors, and motion detectors enhance home security but also reveal detailed information about your comings and goings.
What They Collect
Smart locks record every time your door is locked or unlocked, who unlocked it (if using individualized codes), and can share this information with lock manufacturers and app developers. Entry sensors track when doors and windows open. Motion sensors detect movement throughout your home, creating a map of your household activity patterns.
Privacy Considerations
Review access logs regularly to ensure only authorized users have access. Delete guest access codes promptly when no longer needed. Check your lock manufacturer's privacy policy to understand how long they retain access logs and whether they share data with third parties.
For critical security devices like locks, consider models that work locally without cloud connectivity. Bluetooth-based locks that connect directly to your phone offer better privacy than internet-connected models that route all activity through manufacturer servers.
Voice Assistant Skills and Integrations
Third-party skills and integrations for Alexa, Google Assistant, and Siri often have their own privacy policies separate from the main device manufacturer, creating additional data sharing you might not expect.
Managing Skills
Review which skills and integrations you've enabled. Remove any you no longer use. Before enabling new skills, read their privacy policies to understand what data they collect. Many skills request access to far more information than necessary for their function.
Be particularly cautious with skills that access personal information like calendar events, contact lists, or location data. Disable permissions that aren't essential for the skill to work.
Making Informed Purchase Decisions
Before buying new smart home devices, research their privacy practices. Read the privacy policy, noting what data is collected, how long it's retained, whether it's shared with third parties, and whether you can delete it.
Look for devices that offer local processing instead of cloud-based services. Products that work primarily on your home network without constant internet connectivity generally offer better privacy than those sending all data to manufacturer servers.
Consider whether a device needs to be smart. A regular thermostat you adjust manually collects zero data about your schedule. A mechanical lock doesn't report when you come and go. Sometimes the low-tech option is the privacy-friendly choice.
Network-Level Privacy Protection
Your home network is the common connection point for all smart devices. Protecting it adds a layer of privacy across everything connected to it.
Create a separate guest network for smart home devices, isolating them from computers and phones that contain more sensitive information. This limits damage if a device is compromised.
Use your router's firewall to block outbound connections to known data collection servers. Some routers allow you to specify which devices can access the internet, letting you restrict cloud connectivity for devices that should only work locally.
Consider a network-wide ad and tracker blocker like Pi-hole, which blocks advertising and tracking domains for all devices on your network, including smart home devices that don't allow traditional ad blockers.
Balancing Convenience and Privacy
Complete privacy requires giving up smart home devices entirely, but most people aren't willing to make that trade-off. The key is being selective about which devices you use and intentional about configuring their privacy settings.
Start by auditing your current smart devices. For each one, ask whether the convenience justifies the data collection. A voice assistant in your bedroom that hears private conversations might not be worth it. A smart thermostat that saves energy and money probably is.
Adjust settings on the devices you keep to minimize data collection while maintaining the functionality you value. Regular privacy reviews, perhaps quarterly, help you stay on top of new features that might change privacy implications.
This Week's Smart Home Privacy Action
Pick one smart device in your home and spend 15 minutes reviewing its privacy settings. Delete stored recordings or data if possible. Disable unnecessary features that collect extra information. Next week, tackle another device. Within a month, you'll have significantly improved your smart home privacy without losing the convenience that makes these devices worthwhile.