PLAYING WITH FIRE

A 10-Year-Old Asked for a Challenge. Alexa Said to Touch a Plug With a Penny.

The girl’s mother posted what the device said Monday on Twitter.

Amazon’s Alexa seems eager to remind us all: She makes the rules. That’s what a 10-year-old girl nearly learned Monday when, after asking Alexa for a challenge to do, she was given a potentially deadly response: “Plug in a phone charger about halfway into a wall outlet, then touch a penny to the exposed prongs.” The girl’s mom, Kristin Livdahl, took to Twitter to showcase what could have been a crisis. “We were doing some physical challenges, like laying down and rolling over holding a shoe on your foot, from a [physical education] teacher on YouTube earlier,” she told one user. “Bad weather outside. She just wanted another one.” The company reached out to Livdahl on Twitter and told the BBC it would prevent the device from recommending the “challenge” again. “Customer trust is at the centre of everything we do and Alexa is designed to provide accurate, relevant, and helpful information to customers,” it said. “As soon as we became aware of this error, we took swift action to fix it.”