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3PO-Labs: Alexa, Echo and Voice Interface

New Wake Word, and a Bit of Research

1/15/2017

17 Comments

 
We're starting to see scattered reports across a variety of global regions that there is a new wake word - "COMPUTER" - starting to roll out as devices get the newest firmware. For us here at 3PO-Labs this comes as no surprise, as we noted over a year ago - at the same time we predicted the "ECHO" wake word - that they had special logic for "COMPUTER" already built-in but not complete. This provides us an opportunity to dive back in and see if there's anything new to uncover. Read on for some more technical details, and a running list of the information we can collect...


The state of things

First off, here's all the information we've been able to collect about the rollout of the word "COMPUTER":
  • The rollout is happening across all regions concurrently
  • The option becomes available when your device gets firmware version 4812. This follows the numbering convention for first gen Echo and Dot devices. It's unclear so far what firmware version is required on second gen devices, as they use a different pattern.
  • There doesn't seem to be a way to force a firmware upgrade of your devices.
  • Using the source-editing trick we described here does not allow you to enable the wake word prior to getting the firmware upgrade...
We'll keep this list up to date as we collect more information. In the meantime, though, this new change has afforded us an opportunity to do some more investigation.

Digging deeper

So, we gave ourselves a pat on the back for being right about the "ECHO" wake word before it was released, and now for having guessed "COMPUTER", but to be honest it was fairly obvious, as Majel Roddenberry's "COMPUTER" from Star Trek is burned into the cultural hivemind. Obviously one or more engineers on the development team shared the same love for Star Trek as we did, and dropped that wake word in there early, even if it wasn't available to the public. For us, that immediately raises the question of "What else is tucked away in their serverside code?", so we decided to try a few things out and see what we could uncover.

Methodology

Our approach here is pretty simple. Using the technique described in our previous wake word article, we started off with "COMPUTER" as our baseline, knowing that it is special. We tried it against a variety of devices that did not yet have the firmware upgrade - a first gen Echo, a first gen Dot, and a second gen Dot. This allows us to control for both the firmware version and device type variables. We then repeated the process for a wake word we were sure was not ever going to be implemented, "OK GOOGLE". The thought is that if we could differentiate behavior between these attempted wake words, we'd have a hook we could use to analyze other possible entries.

Results

And in fact we were correct, their webservice treats "COMPUTER" differently than "OK GOOGLE" for devices that still don't have the firmware upgrade, and it does so consistently across all of our devices.
Response for wake word "OK GOOGLE"

    
Response for wake word "COMPUTER"

    
Our deduction here is that when you send something like "OK GOOGLE", the service just rejects it outright. When you send "COMPUTER", however, it tries to apply the upgrade to the device, fails, and then the webservice doesn't know how to handle that failure. Essentially, even though the update wasn't successful, we know that there's a special code path for that word in their system. We can use this technique to make further deductions about other wake words - if we get the null error, we know that's an interesting case.

Trying things out

Now this is where you guys come in - we're gonna start a running list of cases we've tried, but obviously we're limited in our creativity for wake words. Hit us up in the comments or directly, and let us know what wake words to test out for you.

Wake Words:
  • "ALEXA" ✔
  • "ECHO" ✔
  • "AMAZON" ✔
  • "COMPUTER" ?
  • "OK GOOGLE" X
  • "SIRI" X
  • "HAL" X
  • "DEEP THOUGHT" X
  • "JARVIS" X
  • "SKYNET" X 
  • "JANE" X
  • "MULTIVAC" X
  • "DORA" X
  • "CYCLOPS" X
  • "JILL" X
  • "BRAINIAC" X
  • "MATRIX" X
  • "ROBOT" X
  • "ROSIE" X
  • "ROBBIE" X
  • "SHERLOCK" X
  • "MYCROFT" X
  • "EINSTEIN" X
  • (Hit us up with ideas to try...)
17 Comments
Chris
1/15/2017 03:28:09 pm

Jane (sentient AI from Orson Scott Card's Ender universe)
Multivac (an Asimov series of supercomputers)
Dora (a Heinlein spaceship computer)
Friday (in Tony Stark's home)
Cyclops (a Brin sentient computer)
Jill (a developing sentient computer from Greg Bear)
Brainiac
Matrix
Robot

Reply
Eric link
1/16/2017 09:35:37 am

Nada. Your list is fairly interesting in that it contains some words that could theoretically be extremely strong candidates phonetically, like "Multivac", and then some that would be extremely weak, like "Friday". I wonder if they ever explored the accidental triggering aspect of "Friday" in the Iron Man comics...

Reply
Jake B
1/16/2017 12:40:36 am

Some of the wake words like "Ok Google" could be deliberately rejected as known wake words to other devices, so Echo could be better trained to avoid triggering on those.

Reply
Eric link
1/16/2017 09:25:04 am

That's a good point, for a baseline it was probably not the best choice, as we could've been dealing with a blacklist of terms disallowed instead of a whitelist of terms allowed. I tried it out with a completely random term ("WALUIGI") unrelated to any sort of AI or voice assistant, and confirmed that the behavior is the same, with the 400 status code. It definitely seems like a whitelist.

Reply
Laurie link
1/16/2017 08:02:07 am

Rosie-The Jetsons
Robbie-Forbidden Planet
Sherlock-cuz Sherlock
Einstein - genius

Reply
Eric Olson
1/16/2017 09:30:11 am

No luck. It got me thinking, though, that "EINSTEIN" is an interesting case - it's probably phonetically distinct enough in English to avoid a lot of false positives, but maybe would be more problematic for a German speaking household. Seems like right now they aren't tailoring wake words to specific regions yet

Reply
Samantha Daily
12/22/2017 07:45:26 am

Has anyone tried GLaDOS? When the Echo sings she sounds just like GLaDOS.

Reply
Katy
12/28/2017 12:42:19 pm

I want SARAH as an option. #Eureka

Reply
Mac
12/30/2017 08:53:15 am

I would love to see "MARVIN" as a name, like the robot from Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I've wondered if three syllable words are ideal for wake words though (ECHO being an exception), but then wouldn't an easy fix be changing it (and other potential names) to something like "MARVIN BOT"?

Reply
RoHan Schrodinger-Von Socha
4/25/2018 05:41:02 pm

My first choice was AVA, from Ex-Machina, but unfortunately no good=(.

WATSON (jeapardy computer champion)

Reply
Dean
6/18/2018 02:49:48 am

Falken (from War Games)
Watson (The IBM computer and the telephone inventor assist)
Marconi (long distance radio transmission inventor)
Ahoy (Naval term)

Reply
Dean
6/18/2018 02:52:34 am

Joshua
Wopper Both from War Games movies

Reply
Dean
6/18/2018 02:51:10 am

Dumbass (term used by Red Forman of That 70's show)

Reply
Brett
7/28/2018 02:59:52 pm

We have developed a home theatre system called "Hits" (Home Interactive Touch System) so the word Hits would be helpful, we will be releasing the product once full testing completed.

Reply
Henry
1/17/2019 10:54:48 pm

Yuki

Reply
Rin
11/21/2019 03:13:36 pm

Luna-P (Sailor Moon)

Reply
essay paper help link
4/19/2020 12:11:23 am

it seems like you are currently working for a certain research. if that's the case then I wish that you will find all the solution you have in your mind. I know that the job can get really stressful as you have to deal with details; being observant is indeed part of everything so there are several adjustments that you have to make! But I know that you can do it as long as you're going to keep the faith!

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    We're 3PO-Labs.  We build things for fun and profit.  Right now we're super bullish on the rise of voice interfaces, and we hope to get you onboard.



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