How does Alexa work? Simply explained

Once you’ve figured out how Amazon’s Alexa voice control works, it can make your life easier in many ways.

Your personal voice-controlled assistant: How Alexa works

Amazon’s voice assistant Alexa is clever and can help you almost every time. We’ll tell you exactly how it works below.

• Alexa runs on a smartphone app, on Amazon Echo devices, and on certain third-party gadgets. Some of Amazon’s own devices also have a display and, depending on the price, different sound qualities.
• Your voice assistant is waiting for an activation command such as “Alexa” and then records and evaluates the following words.
• First, what you say is transcribed. Then an algorithm tries to find out what you want to do based on keywords. This works in a similar way to a Google search.
• Now Alexa can retrieve information for you on the internet, in your Amazon account or from third-party services and play it back to you as voice output.

These are the tasks Alexa can perform for you

Alexa can help you with many everyday tasks right from your home.

• For example, you can create a shopping list with Alexa or ask her to set an alarm.
• If you have a subscription to a streaming service like Amazon Music or Spotify, you can say something like “Alexa, play 90s music” and Alexa will play the music for you. If you have a Fire TV or a smart music system, you can also play content through it and control playback with just your voice.
• With your Amazon account, you can use Alexa to order products directly. Try saying something like “Alexa, order cat food.” After the product name and price are mentioned, you can select a product and say “Buy now.”
• Alexa can also make small talk. Why not try asking her how old she is or whether she has a pet? If you like, Alexa will even sing a song for you or recite a poem, making her a good conversation partner for older people with few social contacts.
• We present the most useful voice commands in another practical tip.

Expand Alexa with Skills

You can teach Alexa even more functions with so-called Skills. You can download these from a store.

• With the right skill, you can, for example, control your smart home environment with your voice.
• Many radio stations and podcasters have released their own skills for entertainment purposes. But there are also games.
• There are almost no limits to the expansion of the range of functions with skills. We present the best skills for Alexa in another practical tip.

Data protection and security with Alexa

An important aspect of using voice assistants like Alexa is the privacy and security of personal data. Amazon has taken various measures to protect user privacy while providing an optimal user experience.

• Alexa’s privacy policy: Amazon places a high value on protecting the privacy of its users. Alexa’s privacy policy explains in detail how Amazon handles the data collected and what information is stored. The recorded voice commands and transcripts are stored in encrypted form in the Amazon cloud to ensure data security. This data is used to improve Alexa’s performance and deliver personalized results.Alexa Voice Service analyzes the speech input to better understand the user and continuously learns.
• Adjusting privacy settings: Amazon offers users the opportunity to adjust their privacy settings and control how their data is used. For example, in the Alexa settings, users can enable the deletion of voice recordings to regularly delete their data. In addition, users can decide whether they want to share their voice recordings to improve Alexa
• Alexa security precautions: Amazon has taken extensive security precautions to protect users’ personal information. This includes measures such as encryption of voice recordings and transcripts, protection against unauthorized access to the Amazon cloud, and continuous security reviews and updates.