Saint Louis University in Missouri is first to adopt the use of Amazon’s Eco devices in their campus. Aimed to serve as an aid to their students, more than 2,300 Echo Dot smart speakers have been installed in various parts of the university including student rooms. The Echo Dot speakers are designed to answer over 100 questions concerning the campus such as, where is the hall room; when will the library be open; what time is the next lecture when the gym is free and also helps with student’s educational queries. Google Initiates Steps to Increase Transparency on Political Ads.

To maintain and secure the privacy of the students, the University said, "Because of our use of the Amazon Alexa for Business (A4B) platform, your Echo Dot is managed by the central system dedicated to SLU. This system is not tied to individual accounts and does not maintain any personal information for any of our users, so all use currently is anonymous. Additionally, neither Alexa nor the Alexa for Business management system maintains recordings of any questions that are asked." Well, students at Saint Louis University is also given the liberty to not opt for this services, which can be done by just switching the device to ‘Mute’. Apple Probed Under Anti-Monopoly Act by Fair Trade Commission: Report.

With a successful pilot program organised last year, Saint Louis University has now confirmed that it will be taking on the decision to use Echo Dot speakers starting this year. Seeing the progress that Saint Louis University achieved, Northeastern University in Boston also announced that it would also be handing out Echo Dots to their students, but on trial basis.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Aug 16, 2018 04:18 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).