Woman sets up Alexa. Then it starts making a strange noise in the middle of the night: ‘My husband works in IT…’

As AI continues to become more and more prevalent, people have started to comment on its unusual quirks.

One woman is going viral for an unusual and “scary” encounter with an AI-powered virtual assistant. But does she have a reason to fear her Alexa?

‘I wish this was a joke'

Music teacher and composer Sarah Ochoa-Hughey (@ms.musicmaestra on TikTok) posted a video that has more than 10.2 million views. In it, she documented her Alexa allegedly making an eerie, unprompted noise in the middle of the night.

In the TikTok, Ochoa-Hughey's camera pointed at a round Alexa placed on a table in a dark room. The clock view on the Alexa indicated it was 1:17 a.m. For the entire duration of the 21-second video, the Alexa appeared to be emitting the sound of a person typing.

“Can someone explain to me why our Alexa is randomly making a typing sound in the middle of the night??” Ochoa-Hughey wrote in the text overlaying her video.

She called the whole thing “scary” in her caption.

“Help…I'm scared,” she wrote. “I wish this was a joke.”

In a follow-up video response to one viewer's comment saying this situation “would be enough for [them] to never use [Alexa] again,” Ochoa-Hughey filmed herself throwing away the Alexa and its charger into an outdoor garbage bin.

“Replaced Alexa with a normal alarm clock / sound machine,” Ochoa-Hughey wrote in the text of her video. “Alexa is gone.”

Unnerved viewers disavow Alexas

Ochoa-Hughey's comment section was littered with “scared” viewers who expressed their beliefs that smart devices like Alexas are violation-prone vehicles for surveillance, with one person even joking that “an agent accidentally turned their mic on.”

“My husband works in IT and he made it clear that we will NEVER own one,” a viewer wrote. Another replied, “We had an IT security talk at work, and the one thing I'll always remember he said is ‘oh, the cloud' is just…someone else's computer.'”

“Hi. I used to work for Google,” said one commenter. “You know what I don't allow in my house? any device like this. i don't even allow a smart thermostat.”

“I used to work for Amazon,” echoed another. “You do realize that they are actually listening to you. I have unplugged every Alexa I've ever had. I will never use one again.”

“I've spent 20+yrs working in tech,” said a third. “You couldn't pay me to put an Alexa, Facebook or Google product in my home or to accept any T&C allowing my tv to connect the internet.”

Does Amazon Alexa spy on its users?

Other social media users have reported hearing typing sounds from their Alexas before, raising concerns about possibly being hacked. Such noises can also result from Alexa inadvertently connecting to a household member's device via Bluetooth, and projecting the sound of them texting via its speakers. However, are Ochoa-Hughey and her viewers right to be suspicious? Could there be something more going on here?

In a way, yes. Alexas are technically only triggered by specific “wake words,” like the name “Alexa.” The devices only record when spoken to directly; the Alexa is always listening for those wake words while plugged in. And as of March 2025, Amazon customers can no longer opt out of their conversational data being collected. Wired reported that “recordings of every command spoken to the Alexa living in Echo speakers and smart displays will automatically be sent to Amazon and processed in the cloud.”

Additionally, in May 2023, The New York Times reported that Amazon paid “a civil penalty of $25 million to settle federal charges that it kept sensitive information collected from children for years, including their precise locations and voice recordings, in violation of a children's online privacy law.”

Buzz News reached out to Amazon via email and Ochoa-Hughey via contact form.

@ms.musicmaestra Help…I'm scared. I wish this was a joke. #hacked #alexa #scared #scarytiktoks #scary ♬ original sound – Sarah Ochoa-Hughey