Inching down the freeway, a driver realizes she’s forgotten her weekend plans and asks her digital copilot to check her calendar. Within seconds, a voice emanates from the car’s speakers telling the driver that she has RSVP’d to a friend’s birthday party and then suggesting a gift—a Detroit Lions jersey.

The entire process ends less than two minutes after the driver asks the digital assistant to order the jersey. Meanwhile, the dialogue inside the car is sent to a distant data center, ready to be mined for ads pitching an NFL game, even though the driver dislikes football.

Once clunky and buggy, voice-recognition technology is improving and quickly spreading to the dashboard, allowing drivers to issue a wider range of commands using natural speech. Designed to keep drivers’ eyes on the road, “personal assistants” powered by artificial intelligence can perform a variety of functions, from managing calendars to placing Amazon Prime orders.

When synced with smart-home gadgets, the software can also turn up the thermostat, turn off the lights, and lock the doors from miles away. But if the benefits of bringing Amazon Alexa, Apple’s Siri, or Google Assistant into the car seem endless, so do concerns about privacy and how the information collected will be used.

“Consumers have good reasons to be concerned about the use of voice-recognition systems in cars,” says Christine Bannan, an attorney for the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a consumer advocacy group in Washington, D.C. “There is a false narrative that because consumers embrace new technology, that means they are indifferent about privacy.”

An estimated 120 million cars will be equipped with voice-recognition systems next year, up from 40 million in 2018, according to IHS Markit. Currently, most in-car systems are smartphone-based, but Amazon and Google are also developing embedded devices that can work in cars without being tethered to a phone.

“Apple CarPlay and Android Auto are available in even the cheapest models now,” says Ed Kim, a vice president at automotive research firm AutoPacific. “I would imagine that within five years, the vast majority of new vehicles will have some form of voice recognition.”

一位司机正开着车子在高速公路上行驶，突然她想到，我这周的周末要干什么来着？于是她通过语音助手功能要求车载系统查看一下她的日程安排。几秒钟后，汽车喇叭里来传来声音，告诉她系统已经自动回复了一个朋友的生日宴会邀请，并且建议她带上一件生日礼物——一件底特律雄狮队的球衣。

于是，这名司机要求数字助手下单订购这件球衣。不到两分钟，下单已经成功了。与此同时，车内的这段对话已经被发送到了一个远程数据中心，用于针对NFL比赛的广告分析——即便这位司机并不喜欢橄榄球。

语音识别技术并不是什么新生事物，只不过以前的语音识别技术很不完善，识别的正确率也不高。但近年来，这项技术得到了突飞猛进的发展，并且迅速与汽车技术进行融合，使驾驶员能够使用自然语言发布更加广泛的指令。有了人工智能的加持，新的“个人助理”功能可以执行从日程管理到在线网购的一系列功能，在这个过程中，司机的眼睛可以始终看着道路，只用语言下达指令。

与智能家居设备同步后，语音识别软件还可以远程控制恒温器、灯和门锁。虽然亚马逊Alexa、苹果Siri、谷歌助手等语音识别软件为有车一族带来了许多便利，但由此带来的隐私问题和个人数据采集问题也是十分值得关注的。

位于华盛顿的消费者权益保护机构电子隐私咨讯中心（Electronic Privacy Information Center）的律师克里斯汀·班南认为：“消费者有充分的理由担心车载语音识别系统的隐私问题。有人说消费者是欢迎这项新技术的，这说明他们并不担心隐私问题。这是一种诡辩。”

IHS Markit公司的数据显示，到明年，搭载有语音识别系统的汽车预计将达到1.2亿辆，是2018年的4000万辆的3倍。目前，大多数车载系统都是基于智能手机的，不过亚马逊和谷歌也在开发不需要与手机绑定的车载模块。

汽车行业研究机构AutoPacific的副总裁埃德·金指出：“现在，就连最便宜的车型上也能使用苹果的CarPlay和安卓的Android Auto。可以想象，五年之内，大多数新车都将搭载某种形式的语音识别功能。”

That means more drivers will have access to technology that alerts them to a sale at a nearby store—via an audio cue or an on-screen prompt—or ensures that their grande latte is ready when they swing by their local Starbucks.

But manufacturers, marketers, and other businesses may gain even more. Once artificial intelligence becomes better at understanding and interpreting speech across a range of dialects, accents, and colloquialisms, cars will be able to glean even deeper insight into drivers’ behavior and share that information with other companies.

While it may be convenient for cars to know your shopping habits and favorite places, that information can also be used to create targeted audio or visual ads, sell subscription services, or tip off third-party businesses. The more data that Amazon, Google, and Apple collect by placing their devices inside cars, the more opportunities they have to serve—or sell to—customers.

For now, automakers are gearing up to reap the rewards. Some manufacturers are forgoing technology from Amazon, Apple, and Google to install their own. Proprietary systems from Mercedes-Benz and BMW that are slated to debut this year will let manufacturers compete with the tech giants for driver data.

“In the coming years, the battleground will be over user data and the revenue made possible,” Kim says.

Although the devices are supposed to listen only when a “wake” phrase like “Hey, Alexa” is used, the process is not foolproof. Anecdotes from users worldwide range from amusing to horrifying. The most worrisome are incidents in which the devices accidentally record and send conversations to contacts in users’ phones, or inadvertently make large purchases. Amazon has begun taking measures to prevent unintended commands, including allowing customers to set a PIN for voice activated purchases and asking for confirmation before placing a call.

Currently automakers say they get cus¬tomer permission before they use the individual data they collect for marketing or share it with third parties. Volvo said in a statement that its technology “tak ” and complies with a European Union law that lets residents control how t leheir personal data is shared.

An Amazon spokesman says that the company merely shares “anonymized, aggregated performance data to help automakers improve the customer experience” and that it doesn’t provide personally identifiable information to car companies or developers.

BMW shares the data it collects but says it doesn’t make money from it directly. “Let’s say the person is listening to certain music, and we know there’s a big concert,” says Dieter May, senior vice president of digital products for BMW. “Then we would probably give that to our salespeople to make an offer for a special ticket.”

But even as governments and corporations begin to address security questions, it’s unclear who will control the data that is collected.

“It’s the latest shiny thing in the car, and the one with the best speech recognition will win,” says Roger Lanctot, associate director for automotive at Strategy Analytics, a market research and consulting firm. “In our winner-take-all world, that win will be very lucrative.”

This article originally appeared in the February 2019 issue of Fortune.

这也意味着，当附近的商店打折时，司机通过语音或屏幕上的提示，可以迅速获知相关促销信息。再举个例子，当司机想喝咖啡时，他可以先通过语音助手下单，这样等他将车子开到星巴克时，他的大杯拿铁已经做好了。

车载语音系统的普及，也给很多制造企业、营销机构和其他企业带来了利好。一旦人工智能技术能够更好地理解各种口音和方言、俗语，汽车就可以对驾驶员的行为产生更深入的见解，并将这些信息与其他企业进行共享。

语音识别技术使汽车能够轻易收集你的购物习惯和你常去的地方的信息，但同时这些信息也可能被用来制作有针对性的视频或音频广告，或是销售订阅服务，甚至是被泄露给第三方企业。对于亚马逊、谷歌和苹果这种大公司来说，他们通过汽车收集的用户数据越多，就有更多的机会将这些数据卖给其他客户。

目前，各大汽车厂商都在加速收割语音识别技术的红利。有些厂商放弃了亚马逊、苹果和谷歌的技术，转而研发自己的车载语音识别系统。比如今年，梅赛德斯奔驰和宝马都将推出自己的独家产品。科技公司与汽车厂商围绕车主数据的争夺必将愈演愈烈。

埃德·金表示：“未来几年，用户数据及其可能产生的收益，将成为双方争夺的战场。”

虽然语音识别系统一般都需要一个“唤醒词”才能被唤醒，但这个过程也并非是万无一失的。在全球用户使用语音识别系统的过程中，也曾出现过许多各种各样的问题和状况，有些状况比较搞笑，而有些状况则只能用恐怖来形容。最令人担忧的是，在某些案例中，系统不小心将人机对话发送给了车主手机通讯录中的联系人。在个别案例中，系统意外下单购买了大量商品。亚马逊已经采取了一定措施，以避免这些意外状况的发生——比如允许用户针对语音识别程序设置网购密码，在接打电话时先要求用户确认等。

目前，很多汽车厂商都表示，他们在使用用户数据进行营销，或将用户数据与第三方共享时，会首先征得用户的许可。比如沃尔沃在一份声明中称，该公司的技术符合欧盟关于个人数据收集的相关法律，并且允许让用户来决定其个人数据的分享方式。

亚马逊公司的一位发言人表示，亚马逊分享的只是“匿名化和汇总后的特性数据，以帮助汽车制造商改善客户体验。”亚马逊不会向汽车厂商或开发者提供任何个人身份信息。

宝马公司表示，该公司虽然会共享它收集的一些数据，但不会直接通过它赚钱。宝马负责数字产品的高级副总裁迪特尔·梅表示：“假设某个人正在车上听一首音乐，而我们发现最近恰好要开一场大型音乐会，我们可能就会把这个信息转给销售部门，使用户有机会买到一张特价票。”

虽然政府和企业已经开始着手解决车载语音识别系统的信息安全问题了，但目前尚不清楚谁将掌握这些收集到的数据的控制权。

市场研究机构Strategy Analytics的汽车业务副总监罗杰·兰托特认为：“语音识别是汽车行业的最新亮点，拥有最好的语音识别技术的厂商必将胜出。在这个赢者通吃的世界，赢家的回报将是相当奢侈的。”（财富中文网）

本文原载于2019年2月刊的《财富》杂志。

译者：朴成奎