According to the Financial Times, Amazon is finished under investigation by the European Union foracquisition from 1,7 billion dollars of iRobot, manufacturer of intelligent vacuum cleaners Roomba.
La EU Commission asked the e-commerce giant by reply to some questions regarding the transaction. Operation, already in the subject of analysis by the American Antitrust, the FTC (Federal Trade Commission).
While the FTC examine the agreement for concerns arising from market power of Amazon in the field of smart appliances, theUE she focused on privacy risk and data privacy. L'obiettivo of the investigation is to understand whether this agreement could allow Amazon to combine the data it already collects with Alexa to obtain a competitive advantage.
Customer privacy is at risk
The EU commission believes, in fact, that the robot vacuum cleaners of Roomba are capable of collect data during their cleaning operations. In particular, we question the ability of the robot to shoot photo as he moves around the house. All information that could then be delivered to Amazon for profile your customers more accurately.
The precedent and the defense of Amazon
The risk of infringe privacy of users via photo shoots is a fact that it really is happened. Some Roomba models actually take photos of each obstacle present, which they then send to your smartphone. In 2020, in Venezuela one device has took pictures of a woman while sitting on the toilet with her pants down. The robot has then sent the photos to a company which handled the photos to implement artificial intelligence. Subsequently it seems that some workers of this Startup have shared these photo in some groups on Facebook.
The American giant at the moment yes defends against the charges stating that the claiming that the Roomba has built-in restrictions , confidentiality is guaranteed and that the acquisition of iRobot does not give to Amazon no market advantage particular compared to its rivals as there are many similar machines on the market. Also, to ensure the safety of the devices, Amazon has clamped down on iRobot's partner companies that provide image management services.
Once the survey is completed, it will be seen what opinion the European Commission will take.