Bäckström, T. (2025). Privacy in Speech Technology. In Proceedings of the IEEE, vol. 113, no. 7, pp. 668-692, July 2025.
Abstract
Speech technology for communication, accessing information, and services has rapidly improved in quality. It is convenient and appealing because speech is the primary mode of communication for humans. Such technology, however, also presents proven threats to privacy. Speech is a tool for communication, and thus, it will inherently contain private information. Importantly, it also contains a wealth of side information, including details about health, emotions, affiliations, and relationships, all of which are private. Exposing such private information can lead to serious threats such as price gouging, harassment, extortion, and stalking. This article is a tutorial on privacy issues related to speech technology, modeling their threats, approaches for protecting users’ privacy, measuring the performance of privacy-protecting methods, perception of privacy, as well as societal and legal consequences. In addition to a tutorial overview, it also presents lines for further development where improvements are most urgently needed.
More information
Here is an interview where the author talks about the article: Your voice gives away valuable personal information, so how do you keep that data safe?