Hello Barbie: Hang on, this Wi-Fi doll records your child's voice?

[Arcadiasix]

Vid Toymaker Mattel has unveiled a high-tech Barbie that will listen to your child, record its words, send them over the internet for processing, and talk back to your kid. It will email you, as a parent, highlights of your youngster's conversations with the toy.

If Samsung's spying smart TVs creeped you out, this doll may be setting off alarm bells too – so we drilled into what's going on.

The Hello Barbie doll is developed by San Francisco startup ToyTalk, which says it has more than $31m in funding from Greylock Partners, Charles River Ventures, Khosla Ventures, True Ventures and First Round Capital, and others.

Its Wi-Fi-connected Barbie toy has a microphone, a speaker, a small embedded computer with a battery that lasts about an hour, and Wi-Fi hardware. When you press a button on her belt buckle, Barbie wakes up, asks a question, and turns on its microphone while the switch is held down.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/02/19/hello_barbie/

[gordianot]

1. You mean they do not already do that?

[FLPanhandle]

2. So much for a child using their imagination

The doll sounds like a cheap iPhone Siri though.

[pnwmom]

3. Is Siri recording people's voices and sending them into the cloud?

A good reason not to use it then.

Children can't give consent. They shouldn't be using these phones.

[FLPanhandle]

5. Yes Siri is cloud based

However, the tech doesn't bother me.

Kids should be able to use their own brains for entertainment.

[pinboy3niner]

4. It sends the child's conversations back to the parents

This goes far beyond Siri.

[pnwmom]

6. And what if a child tells her Barbie she's being molested?

What will the cloud do then?

I bet it would do nothing because that could cut into their sales.