Amazon Echo called as witness in murder trial

Amazon is rumored to launch a new Alexa device which will facilitate voice calls with other Alexa owners.

If this tech-enabled help doesn’t suffice, you might simply request live tech support directly from Alexa, and a friendly, knowledgeable specialist will call you armed with the information you’ve provided and an understanding of the steps you’ve taken so far.

The new hardware, which was being beta-tested at Amazon as of last month, will also serve as connected intercoms, allowing people to hold conversations between their Alexa devices. That is because Amazon is no longer fighting a subpoena that was issued in an Arkansas murder case after the defendant gave the online retailer permission to share any data that might have been collected by his Echo device. The Bentonville police also discovered that Bates owned an Amazon Echo.

Recode’s report follows past speculation about the potential for Amazon as well as Google and other companies with virtual assistants to enable voice calling through their existing virtual assistant technologies, suggesting they see voice as something like a killer app for their assistants.

Bates was charged with the murder in February of a year ago, and police approached Amazon with a warrant for information from the home assistant. When it was first released, Alexa appeared integrated into Amazon’s Echo, and the price was estimated at $180.

Finally, the company’s latest bounty changes encourage security researchers to focus more on core web applications in the company’s Office 365 offerings.

Also on Monday, Amazon dropped its privacy fight against a subpoena seeking 48 hours’ worth of data from Bates’ Echo, according to Fox News 59. He opines that “Apple keeps dabbling in these markets, but all signs point to Apple slowly retreating from anything that isn’t mass market and ultimately aimed at consumers”.

Users of both corporate and personal accounts in the Microsoft cloud-based productivity service can now get information from their account using voice commands in US-English, UK-English and German.

Saying “OK Google” will activate the device, which is the able to carry out a wide range of functions and features.