{Gadget Watch: BuzzOff} The Smart Speaker Blocker Shuts Them Off with the Words ‘Alexa, Go Away’

Few innovations have changed lifestyle of people in recent years than smart speakers like Amazon Echo and Google Home. They help control home devices, play music, and even answer mundane questions.

However, the concern that they listen in all the time has been around for those who think its posing an unprecedented threat to privacy. Amid the COVID-19 phase, when most are working from home, smart speakers could be recording day-to-day office conversations, which are often confidential.

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Electric Chateau has invented a solution to this problem by developing the world’s first patented smart speaker blocker called BuzzOff. Their aim is to help millions of users take control of their privacy.

Amid the COVID-19 phase, when most are working from home, smart speakers could be recording day-to-day office conversations, which are often confidential

BuzzOff gives the user control over when smart speakers can listen to conversations by cutting the power supply to the smart speaker for the time-frame chosen and restores it later.

BuzzOff Features

The product works with most Amazon Echo devices, and the founders are planning to support Google Home and Nest Home also. It provides convenience in installation because of its size. At just over half an inch thick, it can slide underneath a smart speaker and doesn’t need a wall plug because it uses the one with the smart speaker.

The product works with most Amazon Echo devices, and the founders are planning to support Google Home and Nest Home also

Multiple pieces of the product can be controlled by a single voice command. That means if a user has a house full of smart speakers, they can put a BuzzOff under each one and control all of them with a voice command. All they have to say is ‘Alexa, Go Away,’.

There is also an official BuzzOff mobile app, which is available for both iOS and Android platforms, which helps control each BuzzOff individually if need be. The app helps monitor the status of all connected BuzzOff devices from anywhere.

For example, the app can help know if it’s safe to talk in the living room (meaning the smart speaker there is blocked), but it’s not safe to do so in the kitchen (because the smart speaker there is not blocked).

BuzzOff Origin

The founders, Darren Humphrey, Adam Bellas, and Doug Classe, started the journey to develop BuzzOff two-and-a-half years ago. In February 2020, they successfully secured a patent for it. They deem it their mission to secure the privacy of people. Thus, they strictly adhere to the guidelines set forth by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) of the European Union and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA).

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They have now launched a crowdfunding campaign at Kickstarter to find backers. They are planning to begin shipping the product within the US from October 2020 onwards.

“We’ve built you a robust, reliable, and elegant device that protects your privacy. Our testers have told us that they are using smart speakers more now because they have BuzzOff,” says Darren Humphrey, Founder of Electric Chateau.