Amazon’s audio speakers have paved the way for a new wave of home tech gadgets. Both the Echo, Tap and Echo Dot were excellent products to bring voice-activated AI into our homes. Amazon has expanded its lineup by launching the new Echo Show, which also features a large touchscreen. The touchscreen gives users another dimension altogether to interact with the beloved voice-activated AI Alexa. Alexa has made our lives easier in many different ways. It is our personal assistant that is always awake and always listening, allowing us to create events in calendars, play music, order various things, control lighting and much more. However, this accessibility feature of Alexa that makes it very easy for us to interact with it makes it vulnerable, especially when it comes to purchasing power.
You don’t want your kids or roommates to buy things for you. And you definitely don’t want to be surprised by your credit card bills. Thankfully, Amazon has added a setting inside the Alexa app that lets you set a security pin or disable Alexa’s purchasing power altogether. If you want to do either, you can do it like this:
Setting a Security Pin for Voice Receives via Alexa
one. Alexa App and tap on hamburger menu you can just swipe from left to right to bring up the side menu.
2. Next, tap on it. Settings and scroll down until you find “Purchasing Sound” option as shown in the picture.
3. a “Request confirmation code” choice, Enter your 4-digit PIN code and press save changes. Your PIN is set. Now the next time someone tries to buy something with the help of Alexa, they will have to say the code aloud to complete the purchase.
Disabling the “Buy by Voice” Option Completely
Enabling the PIN is a good step towards securing Alexa’s purchasing power, but it still has one major downside. Since you have to say the code aloud, there is a good chance that someone will easily drop their ear and listen to your code. If you want to fully preserve Alexa’s purchasing power, the only way to do that is to disable it.
1. To do this, we need to follow the similar steps we took in the previous section, i.e. go to: Settings->Voice Purchase.
2. Now instead of setting the PIN, Disable “buy by voice” change. No one, including you, will be able to shop through Alexa anymore.
See Also: How to Sync Apple Calendar with Alexa
Disable Alexa’s Purchasing Capabilities to Avoid Unauthorized Purchases
If you’re looking for ways to prevent people from making unauthorized purchases via Alexa, this is the way to do it. We love Alexa and we don’t want anything to interfere with that feeling. What are your thoughts on Alexa’s voice buying skills? Tell us your Alexa stories in the comment section below.
