Amazon's voice assistant Alexa encouraged 10-year-old to touch an electrical outlet

“No, Alexa, no!

“On Boxing Day Sunday, Kristin Livdahl's 10-year-old daughter is a bit bored during school holidays.

The weather is bad, so the little girl asks the home's smart voice control Alexa, developed by Amazon, to challenge her.

The device then offers to stick a coin to the pins of a live electrical outlet, tells the BBC.

“Plug a phone charger halfway into a wall outlet, then touch a dime to the exposed pins,” the smart speaker launches.

Kristin Livdahl reports the serious incident, which could have claimed the life of her child, on her Twitter account.

OMFG My 10 year old just asked Alexa on our Echo for a challenge and this is what she said.

pic.twitter.com/HgGgrLbdS8

- Kristin Livdahl (@klivdahl) December 26, 2021

“We were doing physical challenges, like lying down and turning around with a shoe on, a [PE] teacher on YouTube earlier.

Bad weather outside.

She just wanted another one, ”says the mother.

"Alexa is designed to provide accurate and useful information"

Alexa therefore "found on the web" this "penny challenge" which has been circulating on TikTok and other social networks for about a year and which consists of placing a coin in contact with a live electrical outlet.

There is obviously a great risk of receiving an electric shock and causing a fire or being heavily electrocuted.

Fortunately, his daughter is "too smart to do something like that", relativized Kristin Livdahl.

Read also "Alexa, erase everything I said": Amazon's voice assistant could have selective memory

In a statement sent to the BBC, Amazon indicates for its part to have "taken rapid measures to correct" this error "as soon as (she) became aware of it".

Hahahahah, NO.

You need to escalate this issue internally IMMEDIATELY as a P1, because this is a threat to life and limb.

You have all the info you need.

Don't wait for customers to do your job for you.

- Shaun Ruigrok (@Shaun_R) December 27, 2021

For the multinational, "customer trust is at the center of everything we do and Alexa is designed to provide precise, relevant and useful information to customers," continued the company, which initially contented itself with refer the user to her customer relationship page.