Attention all gamers. There’s something you may want to be aware of before you plug in that new Xbox One. Apparently, there are a lot of Big Brother features embedded into the system, so much so that that Germany’s privacy chief, Peter Schaar, is raising serious concerns. From Slate:
The complaint stems from the latest version of the motion-sensing Kinect technology. The Kinect device designed for the Xbox One can monitor users’ movements with a camera that sees in the dark, picks up voice commands with a microphone, and reads your heart rate using infrared cameras that track blood flow underneath the skin. Because the device is connected to the Internet, malicious hackers could potentially hijack the console and use it for spying. In addition, Microsoft has filed a patent that suggests it is interested in using Kinect to count the number of people in a room in order to charge each person for providing pay-per-user content. The patent outlines how a camera could be used with face and gesture recognition as part of a Kinect-style system to enforce “age and identity restrictions” on certain kinds of content, effectively granting copyright holders virtual access to private dwellings, as Wired described it.
Microsoft has attempted to play down the privacy fears, claiming that it is “a leader in the world of privacy” and adding that it is not “using Kinect to snoop on anybody at all.” But this has not convinced officials in Germany. In an interview published Sunday by Der Spiegel, the country’s federal data protection commissioner, Peter Schaar, said he was unsettled by how the Xbox One “records all sorts of personal information” that would be “processed on an external server” and possibly passed on to third parties. “The fact that Microsoft is now spying on my living room is just a twisted nightmare,” Schaar told the newspaper.
I guess we can’t even play video games in peace anymore. Sad.
Full article here.
In Liberty,
Mike
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Microsoft has attempted to play down the privacy fears, claiming that it is “a leader in the world of privacy”
I guess it is a matter of trust then. There is no way to verify the claim as the system is a closed black box that is specifically designed so the user cannot examine the software running on it. Putting that aside, my fear is what happens when Big Brother comes along and taps Microsoft on the shoulder and says, we have a “suspected terrorist” and need you to turn on said camera.
All of these wonderful advances in technology are coming at far too large a price to our privacy. (Or if you’ve read The Fourth Realm trilogy, a modern day tribute to Orwell and the like, and treated those works of fiction, based upon fact, you’ll know that this is all by design.)
Just because I am paranoid does not mean they are not watching or following me….
Anyone who would obtain an X-boX is a utter fool
http://www.whale.to/b/x_h.html
There are far more productive things to do with your time
Heh, as soon the these details on the Xbox One emerged, there was an immediate jump in Nintendo Wii U sales, as well as an increased interest in Sony’s Playstation 4.
I don’t plan on buying a new console, but if I do end up doing so it won’t be from Microsoft.
Microsoft angered many gamers (and might’ve screwed the GameStop chain) by charging a fee to play used games on their Xbox One. Between this and Xbox’s disregard for privacy, Microsoft could take a beating on this release. Did I also mention it looks like a 1986 VCR?
Just like cell phones, it will “stay off”, until a three-letter agency wants access.
The key piece in the whole article: “Microsoft has filed a patent that suggests it is interested in using Kinect to count the number of people in a room in order to charge each person for providing pay-per-user content.”
With more people getting their movies streamed to their homes, not only will you have to pay multiple times for the same content, you get to pay per person per viewing as if it were a real theater (once this becomes the industry standard). Brilliant. No doubt someone in Redmond earned a big promotion and/or bonus for this one. When your company is out of ideas and has no more creativity, you’ve got to go for repeat sales.
Copyright trolls rejoice.