Amazon has announced the addition of smart lock control to Alexa’s repertoire of native abilities. The voice assistant has been able to control WiFi enabled door locks for several months, but it required using Alexa Skills and hubs like the Samsung SmartThings Hub or Wink Hub. With the addition of native support, you’ll be able to simply say “Alexa, lock the front door” without having to use a skill. The new feature also supports lock queries, so the voice assistant will tell you the state of your lock by asking “Alexa, is the front door locked?” Locks from August, Yale, and Schlage already support the new feature.
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Does this mean someone could stand outside my window an tell Alexa to unlock my door?
No. For that obvious reason, Alexa cannot natively unlock the locks. Even if some lock manufacturer was dumb enough to try and add that ability, Alexa wouldn’t execute the request because Amazon has wisely not included it on their end.
Remember, this is for the new native ability being added, meaning “Alexa, unlock the door” will never work. But manufacturers can do whatever they want with Alexa Skills, so “Alexa, tell [skill name] to unlock the door” can theoretically work, so be careful what Alexa Skills you allow to control your smart locks. That command should never be implemented, but you never know.
However, according to an article Elias posted last week, amazon is working on upgrading Alexa with voice recognition. So it may be possible in the future
Now we just have worry about the CIA hacking Alexa.
Why are you worried? One,it probably has already happened. Two, do you have something to hide?
If the CIA can do it, so can others. Regardless of what you may have to hide or not, it is reasonable to expect some measure of privacy in life.
Does that mean I can now yell from the front door ” Alexa unlock the front door ” and it will let me in?
No, as pointed out unlock functionality is not voice controlled since Alexa has no way to determine who is asking and you wouldn’t want an intruder to gain entry that way.