Microsoft工作人员正在收听您的Skype对话

Microsoft工作人员正在收听您的Skype对话

Microsoft contractors have been listening to Skype calls — including personal conversations and even phone sex — made through the app’s translation function, according to a report Wednesday.

据周三的一份报告称，微软承包商一直在收听Skype的电话，包括通过Skype的翻译功能进行的个人对话，甚至是电话性爱。

Skype warns its users that some conversations may be analyzed to improve its services, though it doesn’t make clear that the calls will be reviewed by actual humans, Vice’s Motherboard reported.

据Vice的Motherboard栏目报道，Skype警告用户，为改进其服务质量，可能会对某些通话进行分析，但它并没有明确表示这些通话将由真实的工作人员进行审查。

The privacy policy of Microsoft, which acquired Skype for $8.5 billion in 2011, also doesn’t mention this.

2011年以85亿美元收购Skype的微软隐私政策中，也没有提到这一点。

Motherboard received five- to 10-second-long portions of some audio, in which callers are chatting about weight loss, loved ones and relationship issues.

Motherboard栏目收到了一些五到十秒长的音频片段，其中打电话的人正在谈论减肥、亲人和关系问题。

“The fact that I can even share some of this with you shows how lax things are in terms of protecting user data,” a Microsoft contractor told the tech site. “Some stuff I’ve heard could clearly be described as phone sex.”

“事实上，我甚至可以和你分享其中的一些，这表明在保护用户数据方面，是多么松懈。”微软的一名承包商告诉该科技网站。“我听到的一些内容可以很准确地描述为电话性爱。”

The contractors are tasked with reviewing the conversations in order to improve the app’s Translator service, which translates audio in real time into a given language.

承包商的任务是审查对话，以改善应用程序的翻译服务，它将音频实时翻译成给定的语言。

The workers are given rough translations of the communications but must vet them and select the most accurate one — or provide their own translation. The audio is treated as confidential.

工作人员会得到通信内容的粗略翻译，但必须对这些翻译进行审查，并选择最准确的翻译——或者提供他们自己的翻译。音频被视为机密。

The data received by Motherboard shows that contractors are also listening to voice commands through Microsoft’s voice assistant, Cortana.

主板接收到的数据显示，承包商也在通过微软的语音助手Cortana监听语音命令。

“I’ve heard people entering full addresses in Cortana commands, or asking Cortana to provide search returns on pornography queries,” the contractor said. “While I don’t know exactly what one could do with this information, it seems odd to me that it isn’t being handled in a more controlled environment.”

“我听到有人用Cortana命令输入完整的地址，或者要求Cortana提供色情查询的搜索结果，”该承包商说。“虽然我不知道人们究竟能对这些信息做些什么，但我觉得奇怪的是，这些信息没有在一个更受控制的环境中得到处理。”

Microsoft said everything its contractors are doing is aboveboard.

微软表示，其承包商所做的一切都是光明正大的。

“Microsoft collects voice data to provide and improve voice-enabled services like search, voice commands, dictation or translation services. We strive to be transparent about our collection and use of voice data to ensure customers can make informed choices about when and how their voice data is used. Microsoft gets customers’ permission before collecting and using their voice data,” a spokesperson told Motherboard in a statement.

“微软收集语音数据，以提供和改进支持语音的服务，如搜索、语音命令、听写或翻译服务。我们努力在收集和使用语音数据方面做到透明，以确保客户能够明智地选择何时以及如何使用他们的语音数据。微软在收集和使用客户的语音数据之前会得到客户的许可，”一位发言人在一份声明中表示。

The statement added, “We also put in place several procedures designed to prioritize users’ privacy before sharing this data with our vendors, including de-identifying data, requiring non-disclosure agreements with vendors and their employees, and requiring that vendors meet the high privacy standards set out in European law. We continue to review the way we handle voice data to ensure we make options as clear as possible to customers and provide strong privacy protections.”

声明还说，“我们还制定了一些程序，旨在在与我们的供应商共享这些数据之前优先考虑用户的隐私，包括去识别数据，要求与供应商及其员工达成保密协议，并要求供应商满足欧洲法律规定的高隐私标准。”我们将继续审查处理语音数据的方式，以确保我们向客户提供尽可能清晰的选择，并提供强有力的隐私保护。”

Microsoft said contractors are only privy to audio data through a secure online portal and that the company scrubs information that identifies a user, as well as device identification numbers.

微软说，承包商只能通过一个安全的在线门户获取音频数据，该公司会屏蔽识别用户的信息以及设备识别号码。

“I generally feel like that while we do not have access to user identifiable information, that if Microsoft users were aware that random people sitting at home in their pajamas who could be joking online with friends about the stuff they just heard, that they wouldn’t like that,” the contractor said.

“我觉得,虽然我们没有访问用户身份信息,但如果微软用户意识到，穿着睡衣坐在家里跟朋友在网上开玩笑的对话会被听到，他们就不会那么干。”承包商说。

Amazon’s Alexa service recently came under similar scrutiny following a Bloomberg report that found that workers are sifting through as many as 1,000 recordings per shift.

亚马逊的Alexa服务最近也受到了类似的审查，此前彭博社(Bloomberg)的一篇报道发现，工人们每轮班要过滤多达1000份录音。