this post was submitted on 30 Mar 2026
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Ugh, it has a microphone. Eavesdropping malware incoming. And it's another big clonky smartwatch.
It's nice that it has a blood oxygen sensor I guess. And there's a 6d accelerometer. I don't see mention of a temperature sensor either, though with the wireless connectivity and presumed frequent recharging, I guess you can keep correcting the time.
I still like the Sensorwatch (sensorwatch.net) better. Much more modest, smaller, etc. Runs for a year on a coin cell, has a temperature sensor which can used to correct the oscillator and give timing accuracy to within a few seconds a year, and other cool stuff.
“It has a mic, so it’ll definitely have eavesdropping malware” is quite a logical jump to make. Everything has a mic nowadays.
The crappy old Casio that I use now has no microphone and no wireless comms. Just an LCD and some pushbuttons.
I bet your phone also has a mic.
Yes and it's a constant issue, and there is tons of security stuff in the phone to deal with the mic's presence. I've elsewhere suggested making phones with no mics, so if you want to make a voice phone call you have to use an external mic. At least the phone has an important application that uses the mic.
The mic in this watch seems to have been added to the hardware just because they could. But as they say, just because you can doesn't mean you should.
Smart watches often have mics because they can be used to take calls without having your phone on you (still has to be near you unless it's a cellular smartwatch), or to use the assistants or whatever.
The PineTime (Pro) is the one place where this shouldn't worry you because whatever software you're running on it was installed by you so you've hopefully vetted it for security.
I didn't hear a mention of this watch being usable for phone calls but if that's in the cards, then I guess that's a legitimate application, though I don't see how it would work. You hold your wrist up to your ear? Sounds painful. Is it somehow better than using an earbud? If you don't want to walk around wearing an earbud like a Borg when you're not on a call, maybe they could put an earbud holder onto the watchband. The watch could be shaped to accomodate the earbud and maybe even recharge it, if it's shaped like an Airpod.
With the Apple Watch, there's a fairly loud speaker and fairly decent mic, you can pretty much talk with the thing on your hand. No idea if this can do the same though.
I see, like putting the person on speaker phone. Not nice, but thanks!
I have a pinephone, and it has hardware on/off switches for mic, wireless, camera. my bet would be so will the pine time pro.
This is about a watch, not a phone. It looks like they added the mic as an afterthought.