Skip to main content

Is your phone listening to you?

▶ Watch Video: Is your phone listening to you?

A lot of people have had a very creepy experience with their phones. One woman told us, “Sometimes when I talk about something with my friends, then I’ll, like, look on TikTok 30 minutes later – and the same thing will show up.”

One visitor to New York told us, “We were talking about this trip before we came, and then my Instagram reel was just full of New York content for weeks.”

Another woman described talking about trying a type of food with her friends. “And then the second you open the app, it shows you exactly that,” she said. “It’s a bit strange!”

phone-eavesdropping-1280.jpg

CBS News

So, is your phone listening to you? “It is not,” said Ari Paparo, an ad industry veteran, consultant and author. “I’ve been asked about this a million times. And I can guarantee you that your phone is not passively listening to you for advertising purposes.”

Paparo has been asked this before. “Oh, my whole family thinks it’s true!” he laughed.

Paparo says that there is no way anyone could process audio from billions of phones. “Listening to every conversation around the world, and interpreting them and looking for certain words, and then matching them to the ads is impossible,” he said.

So, why does it seem like the phone is listening? First, because advertisers do target you with ads tailored to your interests. But they don’t need to listen to what you say to do that. Paparo said, “They can infer or deduce things about you, like where you live, and your age, and probably what you’re interested in, based on what’s websites you went to or what apps you’ve used. And that whole combination can get pretty precise.”

Secondly, because you might live with someone who searched for a product online.

Why did Facebook show me an ad for a carrot peeler, after I told my wife we should get a better peeler? “Your wife could have looked for a peeler, and then the ad company couldn’t really tell the difference between her and you, because you’re using the same internet in the same household,” Paparo said. “That happens a lot.”

David Choffnes, a professor of Computer Science at Northeastern University, wanted to test whether your smartphone is spying on you. “We did a study with thousands of apps on an Android device, and wanted to see, as you interact with these apps, are they recording your audio and sending it off?

“We didn’t see any surreptitious recording of information,” he said. “But these companies are very good at watching everything you’re doing online.”

And what you’re doing in your home. Choffnes has set up a fake apartment filled with online devices – smart appliances, cameras, smart speakers – to study how much data they send. “We try to identify, are they sending data to places we’re not comfortable with?” he said.

Now, advertisers do not know who you are; they don’t have your name or address. But they do know what categories you fit into. 

And many states require data collection companies to give you your advertising on request. Choffnes, for example, got a copy of his data report, which clocks in at more than 300 pages: “Just filled wall-to-wall with inferences about me,” he said.

Although it’s not especially accurate. For example, it says he has an Xbox (“I do not have an Xbox,” he said), and that he’s extremely likely to go on a cruise (“Which is interesting, ’cause I never want to go on a cruise!” he laughed).

If you’d like to minimize the data you’re feeding advertisers, there are a few steps you can take. 

Choffnes also said, “You can push your lawmakers to come up with laws that are favorable for consumers and not just favorable for the businesses that are collecting data from us.”

And Ari Paparo says your choice of web browser matters, too. “The Safari browser doesn’t allow a lot of this,” he said. “Advertisers are not big fans of Apple and Safari.”

To confirm, he doesn’t believe smartphones are eavesdropping: “I’m sure the phone is not overhearing you,” he said.

And he’s equally sure of something else: “I’m positive that no one will believe me!”

     
For more info:

     
Story produced by Mark Hudspeth. Editor: Karen Brenner.

See more:

Trump is trying to tighten the screws on an Iran numb to economic pain

By CNN
(CNN) — Iran, already drained by years of sanctions and a brutal military onslaught from the United States and Israel, now faces another test as President Donald Trump moves to further tighten the economic screws on the Islamic Republic.The US is preparing measures, to be revealed at a news conference later on Monday, of what Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent promises to be “the toughest sanctions in history” amid deadlock on talks to end the six-month war and as Iran continues inflicting global economic pain by disrupting shipping through the crucial Strait of Hormuz.By the admission of its own top officials, Iranians are suffering.“We are apologetic that these problems exist, as we find ourselves in a full-scale economic, military, and security war,” Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian said, according to state media.“As the government, we are seeking with all our being to steer inflation, public problems, people’s livelihoods, people’s jobs, people’s future, and people’s lives towards dignity and pride,” he added.Videos on social media published last week showed empty markets in Tehran and Karaj, with sellers complaining that their fresh produce is not being bought. One resident of Tehran and another business owner told CNN that economic pressures have become “untenable.”Not only is everything expensive, Nima, a 36-year-old resident of Tehran, told CNN, but some of the “important things needed we can’t even get, like certain medications.”An owner of a small shop who chose to remain anonymous to speak freely about the economic conditions said he is barely making ends meet.“We are running out of some of the foreign products like foreign shampoo and conditioner, toothpaste. We have limited stock and it’s now too expensive for most people, but even the Iranian-made products I’ve had to raise prices on,” he said.‘Immediate Pain’But even with fresh economic pressure, experts say that unless the Trump administration uncovers fresh methods to choke off Tehran’s revenue streams, Washington will once again face a regime long practiced in sanction evasion, resourceful at finding new ways to generate income, and betting on its ability to survive the US’ economic pressure.Over decades of international pariahdom, the Islamic Republic was forced to develop sophisticated methods to mitigate the impact of Western sanctions, creating a decentralized network of front companies, brokers, exchange houses, and a shadow tanker fleet that uses ship-to-ship transfers, altered tracking data, and false documentation to move oil.In 2024, $9 billion of Iranian shadow banking activity occurred through US correspondent accounts, the US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network said, based on reporting from American financial institutions. Shell companies, including those in oil, shipping, and investment, facilitate billions of dollars in transactions through networks spanning the United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong, and Singapore, according to the Treasury Department.Payments are often made in the Chinese yuan, through barter arrangements, or outside the dollar-based banking system, Umud Shokri, an energy strategist and senior visiting fellow at George Mason University told CNN.The latest measures will “squash” the economy of “this murderous regime” and curtail Iran’s ability to “project power through their proxies” and its ability to pay the Iranian military, Bessent told CNBC in a recent interview.But experts said that ordinary Iranians will most likely bear the brunt of the new sanctions.“Ordinary Iranians will experience the most immediate pain, and further sanctions would weaken the rial, increase inflation, raise the cost of imported goods and industrial inputs, and reduce household purchasing power,” Shokri said.Even if public and military spending, as well as regional allies, suffer under the new strict economic sanctions, it will be the wage earners, pensioners, small businesses, and lower-income families that would be particularly vulnerable, he added.The “politically connected” institutions and intermediaries would be partially “insulated” as they continue profiting from smuggling, currency manipulation, and control over scarce imports, Shokri said.Experts say that for the US to effectively target Iran’s economy, it will need to target major Chinese buyers of Iranian oil, independent refineries, and banks processing Iranian revenue, but that could also risk retaliation from Beijing against Washington.In a Truth Social post Trump threatened other countries with “tremendous economic consequences” if they provide any type of “lifeline” to Iran, without naming specific nations.Washington would have to target the central nodes of Iran’s trade rather than continue sanctioning replaceable vessels and shell companies,” Shokri said, adding that the US could aim to sanction tanker managers, insurers, ports, ship-to-ship transfer providers while adding more restrictions on technology that could end up with dual-use military functions.‘Weather The Storm’Even though the Iranian government has expanded domestic production while operating its sophisticated network of front companies to procure essential goods, largely from China, the Islamic Republic has demonstrated that it can transfer the sanctions burden onto an already struggling population while protecting the institutions essential for the regime’s survival.Weeks before the war, Iranians took to the streets to protest rising costs and inflation.Yet after initially acknowledging the economic struggle, the government once again accused the protesters of being foreign agents before unleashing one of the worst crackdowns in the Islamic Republic’s history.For now, the Iranian regime is using the war to justify poor economic conditions and a once struggling government has been given an excuse to its exhausted population, while it is arguably Trump who faces greater political pressure from US consumers angry at gas prices ahead of midterms.“They are willing to weather the storm, and they are willing to go through the pain,” Dina Esfandiary, Middle East geoeconomics lead at Bloomberg Economics told CNN. “None of the measures that President Trump is contemplating are going to make Iran capitulate.”What is required, Esfandiary says, is “diplomacy and carrots” with Iran, which “of course is not at all being contemplated.”For now, Neda, a 34-year-old Tehran resident struggling with kidney disease and needing medication, is holding her breath as she is once again forced to buy only half of her monthly dose.“I have so much anxiety all the time because without the medication I won’t really survive,” she said. “You know, I went to the doctor the other day and the nurse said people weren’t even able to show up to their appointments for dialysis.”“The people receiving chemotherapy stopped going because they just cannot afford it anymore.”The-CNN-Wire™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
Read Next Story

Related Stories

Latest News
Liberia once offered Black Americans a new home. Decades on, it is receiving migrants the US wants out
5 minutes ago

Liberia once offered Black Americans a new home. Decades on, it is receiving migrants the US wants out

Julián Álvarez fue silbado y se fue sin saludar a la afición: ¿qué sigue en la novela del argentino?

Washington se transformó en un circuito de carreras para el Gran Premio IndyCar Freedom 250

Las vacunas contra el cáncer podrían transformar el tratamiento y la prevención, pero la desinformación amenaza su potencial

WUPAGATechNASAPartnership

NASA taps Georgia Tech for $10.5 million push to build the space workforce