A dad of three has left the internet in stitches after revealing that one of his children ordered thousands of dollars worth of toys on Amazon because of the voice purchasing feature.
In a post shared on TikTok in August, under the username @toystorydad_, the man said that after he left his Alexa voice purchasing feature on, his 5-year-old ordered almost $1,000 worth of toys on Amazon, including a $500 hot tub.
A caption reads: "Did you know you can listen to all of the Alexa recordings from the app? It was quite entertaining going through 2+ hours of dialogue he had with Alexa."
From the recordings, the child can be heard saying: "Alexa, add a little hot tub to my cart." This is followed by: "Alexa, get me a monster truck that jumps 23 inches off the ground." Then the child says: "Alexa, add 45 kid spidey walkie talkies to my cart." And this is followed by, "Alexa, get me a lazy river at 45 feet around," and, "Alexa, add 112 water slides to my cart."
Still not happy with his many purchases online, the child also asks: "Alexa, get me a rocket ship that goes 5 trillion miles per hour and 5 trillion feet off the ground."
At the end of the clip, the dad warns viewers: "Parents, make sure you disable voice purchases on your Alexa app so this doesn't happen to you. Has this ever happened to you?! Also, I regret not keeping the hot tub every day..."
If you don't know how to disable this feature, here's a little guide, according to Amazon. Its website says you can disable voice purchasing by opening the Alexa app, choosing "more" and selecting "settings," then opening "account settings," and then again selecting "voice purchasing," and turning it off.
Moreover, you can also limit purchasing so that only recognized people can place orders with Alexa.
The video quickly went viral on social media, getting viewers from across TikTok. It has so far received over 2.6 million views and more than 160,000 likes on the platform.
One user, Mike, commented: "Lazy river? waterslides? walkie talkies? he was trying to make his own water park. even had a way to communicate with staff."
Chyna Cravens wrote: "All of that for $1,000?' Sounds like a deal!" And Tiffany Lee added: "DO NOT WATCH THIS NEAR YOUR ALEXA."
Newsweek reached out to @toystorydad_ for comment via email. We could not verify the details of the case.
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Maria Azzurra Volpe is a Newsweek Lifestyle Reporter based in London. Her focus is reporting on lifestyle and trends-related stories, ... Read more
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