VOA慢速英语2019 谷歌推出隐私工具并下调新款手机价格（在线收听）

Google Announces New Privacy Tools, Drops Price of New Pixel Phone

Google has announced new privacy tools designed to help protect personal data. It has also launched a much lower-cost Pixel phone. The announcements came on the first day of Google’s I/O 2019 conference in Mountain View, California.

Google officials said the new privacy tools would be added to many of the company’s products.

The changes come after Google and other major technology companies have faced repeated calls from privacy groups and lawmakers to take measures to protect user data.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai opened the conference by noting that Google was seeking to keep up with “evolving user expectations” on privacy.

One privacy change will extend Google’s existing “incognito mode” to its Google Maps and Google search apps later this year. The company says that, when activated, incognito blocks user searches or movements from being stored by Google. Incognito mode has been available in Google Chrome and YouTube for quite some time.

The company also announced a new version of its Android phone operating system called Android Q. Google says the new version will give users more controls over restricting how different mobile apps save information like location data.

Android product director Stephanie Cutherbertson said at the conference that the release of Android Q is aimed at protecting “security and privacy.” She said location data recorded by mobile apps is “some of your most personal information.”

Google has been criticized in the past for making it difficult for users to block location tracking. In 2018, an Associated Press investigation found that Google continued storing location data even when users turned off a “location history” setting on Android phones.

Google also announced new privacy tools for its home-based devices. Such systems use voice activation and machine learning to answer human questions and perform user requests.

The company launched a new website to explain how sensors used with these systems activate video and audio recording.

Google says users now have the ability to listen to any recordings the systems make and to clear them at any time. The company also said it would not use video footage, audio recordings or other sensor readings to target users with advertisements.

After the announcements, some critics said they still do not think Google is doing enough in efforts to protect user privacy. They noted that the company makes billions of dollars each year by selling ads targeted at the interests users show through their search requests and data collected by Google apps and services.

“They’re sort of marginal improvements,” said Jeremy Tillman, head of Ghostery, a company that makes internet ad-blocking products. “They are not bad, but they almost seem like they’re designed to give the company a better messaging push instead of making wholesale improvements to user privacy.”

Marc Rotenberg is president of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. He said he believes Google’s privacy measures are too weak. “Unless the Federal Trade Commission is prepared to bring enforcement actions against companies, these promises to protect privacy matter very little,” Rotenberg said.

Also at the conference, Google announced the launch of its lowest-priced smartphone yet – the Pixel 3a. The phone comes in two sizes, with the smaller one priced at $399. The previous version of the device, the Pixel 3, sells for $799.

The company also announced new features for its machine learning-powered Google Assistant. In the coming months, the Assistant will gain the ability to complete a series of steps to carry out some internet processes on its own.

In a demonstration, Assistant was able to fully complete entire travel bookings and buy movie tickets by itself. A similar Android system received a lot of attention at last year’s conference when it used a machine-generated voice to set a haircut appointment on its own.

谷歌推出有助于保护个人信息的新型隐私工具。谷歌同时还推出了一部成本大幅降低的Pixel手机。上述消息在加州山景城举行的谷歌I/O年度大会首天宣布。

谷歌官员表示，多款谷歌产品均将添加新型隐私工具。

由于隐私保护组织和议员多次要求谷歌和其他主要科技公司采取措施保护用户信息，谷歌做出了上述改变。

谷歌首席执行官桑达尔·皮查伊在大会开场时表示，谷歌将尽力满足用户在隐私方面“不断变化的期望”。

谷歌在隐私方面做出的其中一个改变是，谷歌地图和谷歌搜索应用将于今年晚些时候添加隐私模式。谷歌表示，开启隐身模式后，用户的搜索或移动路线不会再被谷歌保存。Google Chrome和YouTube在相当长一段时间之前就已经添加了隐身模式。

谷歌还推出了新版安卓手机操作系统——安卓Q。该公司表示，安卓Q使用户能更好地控制不同手机应用保存信息的方式，比如位置信息。

安卓产品总监史蒂芬妮·卡特伯森在大会上表示，谷歌推出安卓Q的目的是保护“安全和隐私”。她说，被手机应用记录的位置信息“是最隐私的信息之一”。

过去，谷歌因强行追踪用户位置而饱受指责。2018年，美联社进行的一项调查发现，即使用户已经关闭安卓手机上的“位置历史”这一选项，谷歌仍在继续存储用户的位置信息。

谷歌还为家居设备推出了新型隐私工具。家居设备通过语音激活，用机器学习来回答人们的问题并执行用户的要求。

谷歌发布了一个新网站，用来介绍这些设备使用的传感器如何激活视频和音频录制。

谷歌表示，现在用户可以随时收听和清除这些设备录下的音频。该公司还说，他们不会利用视频片段、录音或其他传感器读数向用户发送广告。

在谷歌宣布上述消息之后，一些批评者表示，他们仍然认为谷歌在保护用户隐私方面做得并不够。他们指出，用户的搜索请求以及谷歌应用和服务所收集的信息会显示出用户的兴趣所在，而谷歌针对这些兴趣出售的广告每年可为公司带来数十亿美元收入。

Ghostery是制作互联网广告拦截产品的公司，该公司总裁杰里米·蒂尔曼表示，“可以说谷歌只做出了微小改进。这些改进还不错，但改进的目的是让谷歌能更好的推送消息，而是整体改善用户隐私。”

马克·罗滕伯格是美国电子隐私信息中心主席。他认为谷歌采取的保护隐私措施没有太大效力。罗滕伯格说，“除非美国联邦贸易委员会执行针对这些公司的举措，否则这些保护隐私的承诺没有太大意义。”

谷歌在大会上还推出了其定价最低的智能手机——Pixel 3a。这款手机有两种规格，屏幕较小款定价399美元。而这款手机的上一代Pixel 3的售价为799美元。

谷歌还发布了依靠机器学习的Google Assistant语音助手的新功能。几个月之后，Google Assistant语音助手将增加一个新功能，即完成一系列步骤来自行处理一些互联网进程。

在演示中，Google Assistant语音助手可以自行完成旅行预订和购买电影票的全部过程。谷歌在去年的大会上推出了一个类似的安卓系统，该系统因利用机器生成的声音自行完成了剪发预约而备受关注。

Words in This Story

data – n. information or facts about something

evolve – v. to develop or make something develop

app – n. a computer program that can be put onto a mobile phone or some other electronic device

location – n. a place or position

track – v. to follow the track or traces of something

marginal – adj. small and not important

wholesale – adj. complete or affecting a lot of things, people, places, etc.