“All the mobile phones, computers, and electronic devices connected to the Internet that you carry with you are wiretaps.” (Teachings at Various Places XV, “2019 New York Fa Conference”)
You might think it’s just “random ads popping up on your phone.” In fact, there are many real incidents behind this — tech giants and ordinary users alike have faced controversies over surveillance and voice data collection.
Case 1: Apple’s Siri Sued for “Unauthorized Recording”
Starting September 17, 2014 (when “Hey Siri” launched), the lawsuit alleged that Siri accidentally recorded users without their explicit activation. In January 2025, Apple agreed to pay approximately $95 million to settle the class action lawsuit. Although Apple denied intentional monitoring or sharing of recordings, this case has become an important reference for the risks of voice-assistant surveillance.
While Apple emphasized it did not admit to intentional monitoring, this case has become a landmark on the risks of voice assistants. For our daily lives, this reminds us that “voice assistants” and “always-on microphone” devices do not only work when we actively use them — the risk lies in their passive-listening capability.
Case 2: Marketing Firm Admits to “Active Listening” via Phone Microphones
In September 2024, major media outlets revealed that Cox Media Group (CMG) — whose partners include Facebook, Google, and Amazon — had been running a surveillance technology called “Active Listening,” which actively monitors ambient sounds through users’ smartphone microphones, analyzes conversations, and delivers targeted ads.
According to reports, this technology claims to “respond instantly when a consumer mentions a brand or keyword.” For example, if you casually mention “I need new tires” while driving, or tell your family “Let’s have hot pot sometime,” — without searching anything — you may see matching ads on social media minutes later.
The company claimed in its marketing materials that “everything is legal and user-authorized,” but in reality, many app users had no idea they had unknowingly granted microphone access. This “legal surveillance” sparked enormous controversy, as the passive audio collection was essentially equivalent to “continuous eavesdropping” — companies extract voice data via algorithms, infer emotional states and consumer inclinations, and convert private conversations into advertising revenue.
Most disturbingly, CMG only took down the program page after it was exposed — but by then it was too late. The reality is: the entire marketing industry has long relied on this type of “passive audio collection” technology. CMG was merely the one that got caught.
These events illustrate that while consumers nominally have the “choice” to allow or deny microphone access to apps, in practice these permissions are buried in lengthy terms of service, effectively forcing users to accept surveillance-based marketing. More alarming is that if this technology falls into the hands of malicious advertisers, intelligence agencies, or authoritarian governments, it could become the infrastructure for all-encompassing surveillance.
Case 3: State-Level Spyware — From Pegasus to the CCP Surveillance System
Beyond commercial surveillance, the world’s most watched development in recent years is the deep penetration of smartphones by state-level spyware. The notorious Pegasus, for example, was revealed to be remotely installable on iOS and Android devices, capable of activating the microphone and camera, reading the contacts, and copying messages and calendar data — all without the user’s awareness. These attacks bypass app-level restrictions and reach directly into the operating system’s lowest layers, constituting “hardware-level surveillance.”
While ordinary people are less likely to encounter such high-end attacks, their existence reminds us that phone surveillance is not merely a matter of “strange ads appearing.” Once permissions are breached and low-level components are remotely controlled, the risk escalates to being recorded, tracked, and subjected to long-term monitoring.
More concretely: these threats do not exist only in laboratories or movies. The CCP government has been extensively documented by international reports as using digital surveillance technology to monitor citizens, infiltrate overseas communities, and collect the communications of dissidents and religious groups.
These cases remind us that what truly demands vigilance is regimes that abuse technology for mass surveillance — not the normal functioning of governments in free societies.
For practitioners, truth-clarifiers, or anyone with a high need for confidentiality, these risks must absolutely not be taken lightly. As long as a phone transmits messages through others’ systems and servers, security will always be in someone else’s hands.