Reports are surfacing across the U.S. about Chinese-manufactured robotic vacuum cleaners allegedly hurling insults and making racially charged remarks at individuals.
According to the New York Post, incidents involving the Ecovacs Deebot X2s, a robotic vacuum made in China, were reported in multiple places. The devices unexpectedly spew vulgarities and offensive language.
Daniel Swenson, a lawyer from Minnesota, recounted one such incident in May. While watching TV, his robotic vacuum began emitting sounds that resembled “a broken radio signal.” To his surprise, he could faintly hear a human voice coming from the device.
Alarmed, Swenson checked the vacuum’s app and discovered that someone had hacked into the live camera feed and gained control of the machine. Initially thinking it was a technical issue, he reset the password and rebooted the device. But when he returned to his seat, the vacuum began moving and unleashed a barrage of offensive language, repeatedly shouting expletives, including racial slurs.
Similar incidents have been reported across the States. Around the same time, a case in Texas also involved an Ecovacs vacuum directing racial slurs, and in Los Angeles, another device was reported to have aggressively chased pets. According to the New York Post, it is unclear how widespread the hacking issue is or who is responsible.
Concerned users have raised alarms that hackers may have bypassed the devices’ security measures to control the camera and microphone. In response, Ecovacs has acknowledged the issue and announced plans to release a security update in November to address the vulnerabilities.
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