Apple’s HomeView brings personalized Siri to smart home, takes on Amazon and Google

On Tuesday, Apple unveiled a smart-home hub called HomeView, designed to make Siri more personalized by tapping into iPhone user data. The event took place in New York, showcasing Apple's latest attempt to compete with Amazon and Google in the AI market while maintaining strong user privacy.

During demonstrations, Siri AI was shown to recognize a user's face and perform personalized tasks like fetching recipes from text messages, locating nearby farmer's markets for missing ingredients, and updating shopping lists. If a different household member entered the room, HomeView would recognize that user and switch to their personal data, such as providing information about a friend's early morning flight and coordinating a coffee maker to be ready in advance.

The HomeView device and Siri AI rely on the iPhone to deliver personalized features, aligning with new CEO John Ternus' vision for Apple's intelligent personal hub. Siri's effectiveness depends on its knowledge of the user, which is provided by a personal search index stored on the user's iPhone. Apple emphasized its commitment to privacy, promising that no private data would be used for marketing or first-party advertising purposes.

HomeView features its own operating system and runs on Apple's A18 chip, which processes encrypted user data in a secure section of the chip. To access private data, a user's iPhone must be connected to the same home network as HomeView, with no data stored on the device itself. The device can recognize up to six voices and faces, but prioritization is based on who last used the device, along with other factors.

While HomeView can provide personalized services like weather updates and thermostat controls, these features are accessible to all users in a communal setting.